THE TUNDRA AND ITS FAUNA 21 



character of the tundra animals, like the fewer animals 

 of the Antarctic area, that it is marine plants, rather 

 than terrestrial ones, which form the basis of their 

 food supply. 



Having thus summarized the conditions of life in the 

 tundra we may give some account of the fauna, begin- 

 ning with the ungulates among mammals. The rein- 

 deer {Bangifer tarandus) is widely spread throughout 

 the region, though nowhere very abundant as indi- 

 viduals. On the continent of America there is a marked 

 distinction between those forms which haunt the forests, 

 the so-called woodland caribou, and the smaller forms, 

 with larger antlers, which occur in the tundra. The 

 latter, the barren-ground forms, seem to migrate south- 

 wards towards the forest in winter, but this is impossible 

 with the herds which occur in the Arctic islands. In 

 King Oscar Land and the adjacent regions the Sverdrup 

 expedition found the animal widely distributed but not 

 abundant, apparently on account of persecution by the 

 Arctic wolf. The absence of this animal in Spits- 

 bergen perhaps accounts for the greater abundance of 

 the reindeer there. It occurs also in the suitable parts 

 of Greenland, where the wolf is again absent. On the 

 continent of Asia the reindeer occurs in summer in 

 suitable localities in the tundra region, but here also it 

 seems migratory, and thus not wholly dependent upon 

 the tundra for food. 



The musk-ox (Ovibos moschatus), the second large 

 herbivore of polar regions, has a much more limited 

 distribution. Found fossil in Europe and Asia, it is 

 now limited to the American side of Arctic regions. 

 On the conlanent of America its eastward distribution 

 is limited by the Mackenzie River, but it is apparently 

 abundant in the northern parts of Greenland, in 



