NORTH AMERICA AND THE WEST INDIES 297 



for a deer. Because of their gregarious habits, their manner of 

 living in more or less open country, and a sort of stupid curi- 

 osity they may often be closely approached or attracted and 

 so in former days were easily brought within gunshot and 

 several killed before the herd could escape. In many parts of 

 their range they have become greatly reduced in numbers and 

 merit protection wherever found. As a source of food and 

 clothing they are a mainstay of Eskimo and Indians in the 

 parts of their range where these primitive people live. 



BARREN-GROUND CARIBOU 

 RANGIFER ARCTICUS ARCTICUS (Richardson) 



Cervus tarandus var. arctica Richardson, Fauna Boreali-Americana, vol. 1, p. 241, 1829 



(Fort Enterprise, Mackenzie, Canada). 

 FIGS.: Grant, 1902, pis. [18, 19] (antlers and skull). 



As Murie (1935) points out, the characters distinguishing 

 the barren-ground type from the woodland type of caribou 

 are sometimes "confusing." In general, however, the former 

 is shorter of limb and lighter in color, the antlers tend to have 

 the main beam more nearly cylindrical rather than flattened, 

 and the antlers themselves are less compact, with long, backward 

 then forward curved beam, branching dichotomously at the 

 summit. The two brow tines tend to show a wide triangular 

 expansion or palm. So great is the variation in these structures, 

 however, that scarcely any two are alike, and the opposite 

 antlers of the same individual may be considerably different. 

 Hollister (1912a) states that in the barren-ground type the 

 lower incisors (which in both are small and weak) decrease in 

 size from the middle to the outer pair by conspicuous steps, 

 with the outer pairs very small, whereas in the woodland type 

 the gradation from the middle to the outer pair is more uniform. 



General color in summer "clove-brown, mingled with reddish 

 and yellowish brown, under-parts white; in winter entire coat 

 dirty white " (Lydekker, 1915) . In size this is one of the smaller 

 American races, standing about 46 inches in height at the 

 shoulder. The basal length of skull averages about 365 mm., 

 the maxillary tooth row about 89, but there is a slight over- 

 lapping with the larger Alaskan race (Murie, 1935). The 

 antlers of the male are "very long, slender, and rounded, with 

 few points on the expanded portion of the beam, which is 



