A Talker in the Bunch

Firestone the little bull calf that was born last week, is a talker. Most of our calves call out if they are hungry, or missing their mother, or if they don’t like the looks of someone in their pen. But Firestone must like the sound of his own voice because he ‘talks’ a lot.

During calving, the mother cows moo to themselves during contractions, I think of it as the same kind of involuntary sound like the female tennis players emit when swinging to continue a volley. It’s a monotonous guttural kind of moo from the pains of labor. Once the calf is born, the mother moos a kind of cooing sound. It soothes the newborn and the baby learns the sound of his mothers voice as he/she is being bathed in sloppy, cleaning licks.

Since birth, Firestone has talked back to his mother. As she was cleaning him off,  he would echo her soothing coos. Once he stood up and tried to get into position for his first taste of milk, he was making louder moos at his mother. Pressure has always spoke her mind when she was hungry and we were slow to feed, Firestone seems to have inherited the need to be heard.

Today when I stretched out my hand and said good morning to him. Firestone picked his head up and gave me a good morning moo before walking over to get his neck scratched. It will be interesting to see if he keeps up with his vocal moos as he gets older.