Barren Ground Caribou 
Barren Ground Caribou 
Rangifer arcticus (Richardson) 
Size. Smaller than the preceding. Antlers longer, 50 inches. 
Description. Smaller than the woodland caribou and allied species, 
colours light, almost entirely white in winter. Antlers slender 
with comparatively few points. 
Range. Barren Grounds of Arctic America. 
Recent explorations in the Northwest have discovered a much 
greater variety of caribou than were formerly supposed to exist, 
in fact, no less than seven different kinds are now known to 
inhabit North America. It is impossible at present to de- 
termine the exact relationship between these animals until their 
range has been more carefully ascertained. It is quite likely that 
all may prove to be perfectly distinct species or some of them 
may be mere geographic races, shading imperceptibly one into 
the other. However this may be, the Barren Ground caribou, 
the smallest of the group, seems to be the most widely sepa- 
rated both in appearance and habits from woodland caribou of 
which we have just been treating. ‘‘Its range,” writes Warbur- 
ton Pike, ‘‘appears to be from the islands in the Arctic Sea to 
the southern part of Hudson’s Bay, while the Mackenzie River 
is the limit of their western wandering. In the summer time 
they keep to the true Barren Grounds, but in the autumn, when 
their feeding-grounds are covered with snow, they seek the 
hanging moss in the woods. From what I could gather from 
the Indians, and from my own personal experience, it was late 
in October, immediately after the rutting season, that the great 
bands of caribou, commonly known as La Foule, mass up on 
the edge of the woods, and start for food and shelter afforded 
by the stronger growth of pines farther southward. A month 
afterward the males and females separate, the latter beginning to 
work their way north again as early as the end of February; 
they reach the edge of the woods in April, and drop their young 
far out toward the sea-coast in June, by which time the snow 
is melting rapidly and the ground showing in patches. The 
males stay in the woods till May and never reach the coast, 
but meet the females on their way inland at the end of July; 
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