246 
The Journal of Heredity 
REINDEER FIND THEIR OWN FOOD 
They live in the summer time on the moss and other vegetation on the Arctic plains and in winter 
paw through the snow to get the vegetation that is not exposed. The animal shown in the center 
is a female reindeer, one of the last of the original stock imported from Siberia. 
by Lomen Bros., was taken near Kruzamapa Hot Springs. 
which depend chiefly on the gelatigen- 
ous and starchy matter of which it 
is largely composed. Its taste is 
slightly pungent and acrid. It is 
said, also, to contain tonic qualities. 
It is gray in color, and is the most 
common vegetation in the far North. 
In form it resembles branched coral. 
Other mosses constituting winter foods 
are: Cetraria nivalis, Stereocaulon pas- 
chale, Cetraria tslandica, Parmelia en- 
causta, Parmelia saxatelia. In spring 
and summer the reindeer feeds on 
grasses, willow leaves, buds, mush- 
rooms, marine algae. These may be enu- 
merated as: Aira flexuosa, Aira alpina, 
Poa alpina, Salix hastata, Salix glauca, 
Salix herbacea, Menyanthes trifoliata, 
Mulgedium alpinum, Rumex acetosa, 
Oxsyria reniformis, Gentiana purpurea, 
Ranunculus glacialis, Dryas octopetala, 
Rubus chamaemorus, the Gyrophora 
species, Nefroma arcticum, and grasses. 
Moss is also eaten, to some extent, in 
summer, but not when dry. In the fall 
the mushroom (Boletus, Lycoperdon, 
The photograph, 
(Fig. 3.) 
etc.) especially attract the animal. To 
raise reindeer on other vegetation or 
fodder would necessarily be experi- 
mental. 
The reindeer is an antlered, herbiv- 
orous, graminivorous, ruminant un- 
gulate, and a semi-migratory but 
gregarious animal, of the family Cer- 
vidae, the genus Rangifer, and the 
species Rangifer tarandus, which latter 
represents the type. Sub-species, de- 
pending on environment, have also 
been classified. 
SIGNIFICANCE OF THE ANTLERS 
A full grown reindeer, three years 
old, stands about four and one- half 
feet high, and is about seven feet long 
from its nose to its tail. 
The branched appendages to the 
skull of the reindeer, called antlers, 
though not as large or heavy as those 
of some other members of the deer 
family, are very large in proportion to 
the size of the animal—literally and 
figuratively its most outstanding fea- 
ture. The beams of the antlers are 
