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246 THE FRIENDLY ARCTIC 



The first half of July we hunted from our camp on the mainland 

 opposite Bernard Island, but in the latter half Storkerson and I 

 made a trip into the interior, mainly for exploration but partly for 

 hunting, leaving Ole to guard the depot on the coast. As fat is 

 precious above all things in the Arctic and caribou fat good to eat 

 beyond most food of any kind, we chose to kill old bulls, for they 

 were now the fattest. It is the nature of caribou that different 

 ages and sexes are fat at different times of the year. A compara- 

 tive statement of their fatness is about as follows: 



In late November after the rutting season the old bulls are so 

 thin that there is no trace of fat even behind their eyes, and the mar- 

 row in their bones is like blood. At this time both the cows and the 

 young bulls are about at their fattest, although the proportion to the 

 total body weight is never as high as in fat old bulls. By Christmas 

 the young bulls have lost most or all of their fat, while the cows have 

 less but are still not thin. About this time or in January the old bulls 

 shed their antlers and from that time take on fat, although none 

 is discernible at first. By February or March, when the budding 

 antlers of old bulls are six or eight inches long, the marrow im- 

 proves and traces of fat appear behind the eyes, about the kidneys 

 and on the brisket. The young bulls are still lean and the cows 

 carrying their young have become considerably thinner, although 

 they have a little back fat and considerable intestinal fat, especially 

 caribou in the islands north of Canada where they are fatter than in 

 most places on the mainland. By May or June the cows have lost all 

 fat while the oldest bulls have gained enough so that their meat be- 

 comes palatable. The young bulls show no perceptible change. In 

 July, when the cows are just beginning to fatten the old bulls have a 

 slab of fat on their backs covering the entire body forward to the 

 neck, and reaching on the haunches a thickness of perhaps half an 

 inch or an inch. By late August or early September this fat has be- 

 come three inches thick in extreme cases, and will weigh before dry- 

 ing thirty or forty pounds if the animal is large. At this time the 

 intestinal fat is an additional ten or fifteen pounds besides the great 

 amount on brisket, ribs, pelvis and elsewhere; so that you have 

 from sixty to eighty pounds of fat on an animal the dressed weight 

 of which, when head and hoofs have been removed, is probably be- 

 tween 250 and 300 pounds. The cows also are moderately fat, and 

 gain a little for the next month or two, as do the young bulls. 



From this statement the fatness of caribou is seen to depend 

 not, as is commonly supposed, upon food and climate primarily but 

 rather on the age and sex of the animal. Neither can it be the fact 



