PHOTO: ©MICHAEL MASLAN HISTORIC PHOTOGRAPHS/CORBIS Reindeer Antlers
NLIKE other female members of the deer family, female reindeer grow antlers just like the males. Antlers provide both male and female reindeer with valuable pro- tection for their eyes as well as offensive and defensive weapons, which the males use to spar with one another during mating sea- son and gestating females use to defend their sources of food dur- ing the winter. In relation to the size of their bodies, reindeer have the largest antlers of any type of deer, and like other deer species, they grow new antlers every year. Male reindeer begin growing their antlers as early as February and keep them until as late as Janu- ary, with older males generally losing their antlers first. Female reindeer that are not gestating drop their antlers in the winter as well and begin regrowing them starting in May. Gestating fe- males shed their antlers only af- ter giving birth in April or May and very quickly begin growing a new pair. —JS
U
Three reindeer pose with their Native Alaskan herders in this photo, taken around 1904.
Eventually a total of 1,200 reindeer were imported to Alaska from Siberia, and today, the reindeer population in Alaska and northern Canada is estimated to be about 49,000.
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race of the season is the Kingship Cup, which is held in April in Inari, Finland, and covers a course nearly two miles in length.
Reindeer in America
Let the record show, however, that no reindeer in Lapland has a red nose. Nor have any reindeer with red noses been found in North America—at least, not yet. That’s a fact, which would seem to indicate that all those rumors about a reindeer with a large red nose lighting Santa’s way one foggy Christmas Eve may not be true after all. (Of course, there aren’t any mad mobs of explorers out there searching for reindeer with red noses, so it’s just possible that a reindeer with a red nose is kept in hiding somewhere at the North Pole.)
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At any rate, there weren’t any reindeer, with or without red noses, in North America until 1891, when Dr. Sheldon Jackson, an agent of the US government, had sixteen of them shipped in from Siberia, another place, in addition to Lapland, where reindeer thrive. Dr. Jackson was concerned about the Native Alaskans in northern Alaska, who frequently suffered from food shortages. He believed reindeer could provide Native Alaskans with a source of food and that they could also be used for transportation.
Later, more reindeer were brought in from Siberia, and with them came Siberian reindeer herders who were supposed to teach the Native Alaskans the art of reindeer husbandry. But because of cultural differences, the Siberians left, and in 1894, Sami were hired to train the Native Alaskans to take care of the animals. Eventually a
total of 1,200 reindeer were imported to Alaska from Siberia, and today, the reindeer population in Alaska and northern Canada is estimated to be about 49,000.
So, do reindeer really know how to fly? A lot of people have asked that question over the years. In all prob- ability, the answer is no. Still, you never know. After all, how do you explain all those sightings of Santa’s sleigh in the sky on Christmas Eve? That brings us back to the big question. Can you name Santa’s eight original reindeer? If you said Sneezy, Doc, Happy, Grumpy, Bashful, Dopey, Sleepy, and Prince Charming, you were wrong. If you mentioned Donner and Blitzen, you were close, but not quite there. The correct answer, as written in the original poem, is Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Dunder, and Blixem. ■
D E C E M B E R 2 0 1 0 / J A N U A R Y 2 0 1 1
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