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Reindeer are mammals of the deer family (Cervidae), which also includes moose and elk. In North America, reindeer are called caribou. Reindeer are noted for their antlers, which are large bony growths on their heads. Reindeer are the only deer species in which females also have antlers. The reindeer's scientific name is Rangifer tarandus.

Reindeer are found in the Arctic tundra and adjacent northern forests of Greenland, Scandinavia, Russia, Alaska, and Canada. Two varieties of reindeer exist: tundra reindeer and forest (or woodland) reindeer. Each year tundra reindeer migrate between tundra and forest in huge herds numbering up to half a million. They often travel as many as 3,000 miles (5,000 kilometers). Forest reindeer are much less numerous.

Large reindeer males can measure up to 5 feet (1.5 meters) tall at the shoulder and weigh as much as 700 pounds (320 kilograms). Females are generally smaller than males. Reindeer have deeply cloven hooves (divided into two parts) so that the feet can spread on snow or soft ground without sinking. The split hooves also help the animals to swim. The hooves are covered in hair to protect from the cold and to grip the ice and snow. The reindeer's hair color varies from whitish in winter to brown in summer.

Fully grown reindeer antlers are large in relation to body size. A male's antlers can grow to about 4.6 feet (1.4 meters) long, and a female's are about half that size. Males begin to grow antlers about February. They are fully grown for the fall rut, or mating season. Male reindeer use their antlers mainly to compete for females. Males lose their antlers after the rut, in November or December. Females begin to grow antlers about May. During winter, they use their antlers to dig for food under the snow and to defend their findings from other reindeer. Females lose their antlers after their offspring is born in the spring.

Eurasian and American forest reindeer live in family groups of 6 to 13. They generally range on 190 square miles (500 square kilometers) or less. Tundra reindeer spend winter scattered in forests but gather in spring to migrate north onto the tundra. In fall they mass again to return to the forest.

Summer food includes grass, sedges (tufted grasses), shrub and tree leaves, and mushrooms. In winter the metabolism slows, and reindeer rely on lichens called reindeer moss. Reindeer reach these bushy, plantlike organisms by digging craters in the snow. The calf follows its mother and shares the same food.

Reindeer males cannot compete for females until their fourth autumn, when their antlers and body mass have grown sufficiently large. The rut occurs in October and lasts about 11 days. Tundra males, gathered together with thousands of females for the fall migration, assess other males' antler size visually and thus generally avoid serious fights. Forest reindeer generally fight harder to defend their harems.

In both varieties of reindeer, a single calf is born in May or June after a gestation (the period from conception to birth) of seven and a half months. The calf grows rapidly on its mother's milk, which is richer than that of any other hoofed mammal. Weaning normally takes place at five to six months. Half of all calves born may be killed by wolves, bears, and golden eagles. Longevity is about 15 years in the wild and 20 in captivity.

Reindeer are generally mild and calm, and people have been taming them for hundreds of years. Nearly three million domestic reindeer live in northern Europe. Traditional herders such as the Sami (Lapps) of Scandinavia and Russia use them as pack and draft animals and for meat, milk, and hides. The herders sometimes carve the antlers into tools and totems or sell them for use in traditional medicine. In the forests of the Da Hinggan Range of China, the Evenk people use reindeer as pack animals and as mounts.

There are about 3.5 million wild caribou in North America and perhaps 1 million wild reindeer in Eurasia, mostly in Russia. Despite these large numbers, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) listed the animal as vulnerable in the early 21st century. Vulnerable species are those considered to be near threatened. The IUCN placed reindeer in this category mainly because their numbers have dropped significantly since 2000. In Canada, for example, authorities calculate that caribou populations have decreased some 50 percent. In Russia, several reindeer subspecies are ranked as endangered.

Several factors have contributed to the decline of reindeer. Climate change is causing a disruption in normal weather patterns-including the melt and freeze cycles-in the Arctic. Those changes, in turn, affect the quality and quantity of food for reindeer. Humans are slowly encroaching on the reindeer's habitat. The clearing of forests for agricultural and industrial land, as well as for roads and recreational buildings and activities, lessens the reindeer's range. In addition, hunting and trapping of reindeer is largely unregulated. In response, some governments have vowed to protect the forests that reindeer inhabit. Some environmental groups work to educate the public about the perils of wildlife in general and reindeer in particular.

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Reindeer are mammals of the deer family (Cervidae), which also includes moose and elk. In North America, reindeer are called caribou. Reindeer are noted for their antlers,...

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What is a food chain?

A food chain shows how plants, animals and humans rely on each other for food. We've been making the most of the festive season with these Christmas Food Chains.

Animals get energy and nutrients by eating other animals or plants. If one part of the food chain is affected, so is the rest of the chain. If there was no sun for the caribou moss to grow, reindeers would have less to eat, which would affect humans in areas where reindeer meat is a common food.

Reindeer Food Chain

Reindeers eat caribou moss

Humans eat reindeers

Reindeer Food Chain

Plants are known as producers, they get their energy from the sun. Producers are at the start of a food chain.

Consumers eat other plants and animals.

A predator is an animal that eats other animals. The animals that a predator eats are known as prey.

We're going to make a very simple Christmassy food chain using stones.

What you need

Stones that can be drawn on, we used these beautiful sorting stones from The Consortium
Sharpie pens
Instructions

Draw each part of a food chain on a separate stone.

Can you put the stones in order or stack them in order?

Food Chain Questions to ask
What do you think is at the start of a food chain? The predator or producer?
Producers are at the beginning of a food chain and predators at the end.

A herbivore is an animal that eats plants. In a food chain we call the herbivore the primary consumer. It is the first consumer.

A carnivore is an animal which eats other animals. In a food chain carnivores ( predators ) are known as secondary or tertiary consumers.

A predator is an animal which kills another animal to eat.

Reindeer Food Chain

Extension Tasks

Can you draw a food web?

Can you think of some silly Christmassy food chains? We've got some ideas to start you off.

Candy Cane - Elf

Mince pie - Santa

Carrot - Rudolph - Human?

Seeds - Turkey - Human

More Christmas Science for Kids

Try one of our 20 awesome Christmas Science Experiments for Kids in our round up post.

Or, how about one of these fun ELF STEM Challenges, now with a FREE printable.

Afflilate links

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Reindeer Food Chain - Christmas Science for Kids

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A food chain shows how plants, animals and humans rely on each other for food. We've been making the most of the festive season with these Christmas Food Chains. Animals get energy and nutrients by eating other animals or plants. If one part of the food chain is affected, so is the rest of the chain.

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Are these big, furry, hoofed animals reindeer or caribou? The answer depends on where you live. In Europe and Asia where they have been domesticated, they are known as reindeer. People in those areas rely on reindeer to pull sleds or carry packs.

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CVM's Office of Minor Use and Minor Species Animal Drug Development (OMUMS for short) works hard to make sure safe and effective drugs are available for minor species, like Santa's reindeer (or are they caribou?).

Reindeer and caribou are the same animal (Rangifer tarandus) and are a member of the deer family. In Europe, they are called reindeer. In North America, the animals are called caribou if they are wild and reindeer if they are domesticated.

Both male and female reindeer grow antlers, while in most other deer species, only the males have antlers. Compared to their body size, reindeer have the largest and heaviest antlers of all living deer species. A male's antlers can be up to 51 inches long, and a female's antlers can reach 20 inches.

Unlike horns which are never shed, antlers fall off and grow back larger each year. Male reindeer begin to grow antlers in February and female reindeer in May. Both sexes finish growing their antlers at the same time but shed them at different times of the year. Typically, males drop their antlers in the late fall, leaving them without antlers until the following spring, while females keep their antlers through the winter until their calves are born in the spring.

Reindeer are covered in hair from their nose to the bottom of their feet (hooves). The hairy hooves may look funny, but they give reindeer a good grip when walking on frozen ground, ice, mud, and snow.

Reindeer are the only deer species to have hair completely covering their nose. Their specialized nose helps to warm incoming cold air before it enters their lungs, and it's also an excellent sniffer. Their good sense of smell helps the reindeer find food hidden under snow, locate danger, and recognize direction. Reindeer mainly travel into the wind so they can pick up scents.

Reindeer eat mosses, herbs, ferns, grasses, and the shoots and leaves of shrubs and trees, especially willow and birch. In winter, they make do with lichen (also called reindeer moss) and fungi, scraping the snow away with their hooves to get it. An average adult reindeer eats 9 to 18 pounds of vegetation a day.

Reindeer travel, feed, and rest together throughout the day in herds of 10 to a few hundred. In spring, they may form super-herds of 50,000 to 500,000 animals. The herds generally follow food sources, traveling south up to 1,000 miles when food is hard to find in winter.

Reindeer are the only deer species to be widely domesticated. They are used as draft animals to pull heavy loads and farmed for their milk, meat, and hides.

The antiparasitic drug ivermectin is FDA-approved to treat and control warbles in reindeer. Warbles is a parasitic infection caused by the reindeer warble fly. The fly's larvae can penetrate the reindeers' skin, causing harm to the milk, meat, and hides of domesticated herds. The larvae can also cause disease in people.

Santa's reindeer were first mentioned in 1821 when New York printer William Gilley published a 16-page booklet titled A New Year's Present to the Little Ones from Five to Twelve, Part III by an anonymous author:

Old Santeclaus with much delight
His reindeer drives this frosty night.
O'er chimneytops, and tracks of snow,
To bring his yearly gifts to you.

Two years later, in 1823, the Troy Sentinel published the poemA Visit from St. Nicholas, commonly known as 'Twas the Night Before Christmas. The poem featured eight flying reindeer pulling Santa's sleigh, and for the first time, they are identified by name. (Quiz Question 1: Can you name all eight of Santa's reindeer?)

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer began guiding Santa's sleigh in 1939, when Robert L. May wrote the story of "the most famous reindeer of all" as a Christmas coloring book for his employer, the department store Montgomery Ward. The company gave away the coloring books as holiday gifts to children to entice their parents to visit and shop at the store.(Quiz Question 2: What two names did May consider for his red-nosed reindeer before settling on Rudolph?)

In 1948, May's brother-in-law Johnny Marks made the story into a song. It was featured in a cartoon shown in movie theaters, but wasn't released as a stand-alone recording until 1949 when "The Singing Cowboy" Gene Autry recorded the song and its popularity soared.Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer is one of the biggest-selling Christmas songs of all time. (Quiz Question 3: Is Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer a male or female?)

Quiz Answers:

1. Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, and Blitzen.

2. Rollo and Reginald.

3. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer is most likely a female to have those antlers on Christmas Eve!

Sources:

San Diego Zoo, Reindeer (Caribou)
Altogether Christmas, The History of Santa's Reindeer
Altogether Christmas, The History of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

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Facts about reindeer and caribou. CVM's Office of Minor Use and Minor Species Animal Drug Development works hard to make sure safe and effective drugs are available for minor species, like reindeer and caribou.