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LISTEN | Full interview with scientist Antonio Osuna-Mascar\u00f3:<\/p>\n
As It Happens6:36Veronika the cow wows scientists with her dexterous tool use<\/p>\n
The second Antonio Osuna-Mascar\u00f3 and Alice Auersperg saw a video of Veronika the cow scratching her backside with a branch, they knew they had to drop everything to go meet her. <\/p>\n
The cognitive biologists from the University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna have long been studying tool use among non-human animals<\/a>, but they\u2019d never seen it in a cow before.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe jumped in the car immediately, and we drove for five hours to the south of Austria from Vienna to meet Veronika,\u201d Osuna-Mascar\u00f3 told As It Happens host Nil K\u00f6ksal.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Veronika, he said, did not disappoint.\u00a0<\/p>\n The researchers gave her a broom, and were blown away by how quickly and dexterously she made use of it, employing different techniques to relieve her various itches.<\/p>\n They say their findings, published in the journal Current Biology<\/a> on Monday, upend long-held assumptions about the intelligence of cows.<\/p>\n WATCH | Veronika gets her scratch on: Holy cow! Watch this bovine scratch herself with a broom<\/p>\n Veronika, a 13-year-old brown Swiss cow living in an Austrian mountain village, has blown scientists away with her ability to use a broom to scratch herself, marking a rare instance of demonstrated tool use in livestock. Researchers at the University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna say her dexterity and ingenuity prove that people have long underestimated the intelligence of cows. [Video credit: University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna]<\/p>\n Veronika is a 13-year-old brown Swiss cow who lives as a pet in the mountain village of N\u00f6tsch in southern Austria.<\/p>\n Her owner, Witgar Wiegele, first noticed her picking up branches and using them to scratch herself about nine years ago.\u00a0Over the years, she learned to use short ones to relieve itches near her head, and long ones to get to those hard-to-reach places, Wiegele told the researchers.<\/p>\n Veronika wasted no time showing off her skills for the scientists. Within five minutes of their arrival last summer, Wiegele handed the cow a stick, and she got down to business.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe almost fell on the ground,\u201d Osuna-Mascar\u00f3 said. \u201cIt was really, really impressive.\u201d<\/p>\n The scientist wanted to test whether Veronika\u2019s scratching met the criteria for \u201cflexible tooling,\u201d which is defined as using an object to extend one\u2019s own body while applying mechanical force to a target.<\/p>\n So they gave her a broom.<\/p>\n \u201cBecause a broom,\u201d Mascar\u00f3 says, \u201chas a functional end and a non-functional end.\u201d<\/p>\n Not only did Veronika immediately show a preference for scratching with the bristled side of the broom, but she started figuring out different ways of using the tool to meet her varying needs.\u00a0<\/p>\n She used the broom-end to scratch the thick-skinned parts of her body, like her back, but switched to the handle to get at the softer, more sensitive areas, like her udder and belly.<\/p>\n Tool-use widespread in animals<\/p>\n Benjamin Beck, a retired scientist from the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute and co-author of the book Animal Tool Behavior, says Veronika\u2019s scratching undoubtedly meets the criteria for flexible tool use.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is a wonderful example of tool use by a cow, and it is indeed remarkable that Veronika often uses different ends of the tool, each with different properties, on different areas of her body,\u201d Beck told CBC in an email.<\/p>\n However, he challenged the authors\u2019 assertion that this is the first documented example of flexible tool use in cattle.\u00a0<\/p>\n In his book, he and his colleagues also describe water buffalos in zoos dislodging rails from fences and using those to scratch themselves.<\/p>\n Veronika\u2019s behaviour does, however, seem to be unique among bovines, he said. <\/p>\n Scientists remain divided on whether tool-use in animals is a sign of advanced cognition, or just natural programming.\u00a0<\/p>\n But what\u2019s for sure is that documented tool use in animals is increasingly widespread.\u00a0<\/p>\n Dolphins have been seen using shells to scoop up fish<\/a>. An elephant at a zoo in Berlin has been documented using a hose to give herself showers<\/a>. Some fish use hard surfaces to crack open hard-shelled prey<\/a>. Boxer crabs use sea anemones as defensive weapons<\/a>.<\/p>\n Crows not only use a variety of tools, but even craft them to suit their specific needs<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/1768970170_571_default.jpg\")
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Scientists have documented a brown crown in Austria who uses tools to relieve her various itches. ( University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna)<\/p>\n