Don met with a group of Japanese dogs and their owners to test the Bowlingual, a dog ‘translation’ device.

The Bowlingual is made up of two parts, a microphone and a console. The 8cm wide, wireless microphone is attached to the dog’s collar. It transmits sounds to the palm-sized console, which is linked to a database.

The console analyses the sounds made by the dog, classifying them into six emotional categories - happiness, sadness, frustration, anger, assertion and desire. It then comes up with the best match from around 200 translation patterns in its database. Phrases that fit the dog’s emotional state (such as "I’m feeling great", "I am going to bite you" and "You’re ticking me off"), are displayed on a liquid crystal display.

The Bowlingual has settings for 50 different breeds (if you have a bitzer you can choose a setting based on your dog’s size and muzzle length). As well as a translator, the Bowlingual package includes training tips, medical references and a home-alone mode, which records the barks while you're gone so that you can analyse them later.

It has taken the manufacturer two years and hundreds of millions of yen to develop the Bowlingual, in cooperation with vets, animal behaviourists and acoustics experts.

Further information

The Bowlingual is not yet available in Australia. However, there are plans to develop the product with the proper radio frequencies and languages for many more countries in the future.

Note: the Bowlingual has not, in the opinion of Burke's Backyard, had sufficient testing for us to give any recommendation as to its claimed performance.

Copyright CTC Productions 2003