The Peary caribou (''Rangifer arcticus pearyi'') is a

subspecies In biological classification, subspecies is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (morphology), but that can successfully interbreed. Not all species ...

caribou Reindeer (in North American English, known as caribou if wild and ''reindeer'' if domesticated) are deer in the genus ''Rangifer''. For the last few decades, reindeer were assigned to one species, ''Rangifer tarandus'', with about 10 subspe ...

found in the High Arctic islands of

Nunavut Nunavut ( , ; iu, ᓄᓇᕗᑦ , ; ) is the largest and northernmost Provinces and territories of Canada#Territories, territory of Canada. It was separated officially from the Northwest Territories on April 1, 1999, via the ''Nunavut Act'' ...

and the

Northwest Territories The Northwest Territories (abbreviated ''NT'' or ''NWT''; french: Territoires du Nord-Ouest, formerly ''North-Western Territory'' and ''North-West Territories'' and namely shortened as ''Northwest Territory'') is a federal territory of Canada. ...

in Canada. They are the smallest of the North American caribou, with the females weighing an average of and the males . In length the females average and the males . Like other caribou, both the males and females have

antler Antlers are extensions of an animal's skull found in members of the Cervidae (deer) family. Antlers are a single structure composed of bone, cartilage, fibrous tissue, skin, nerves, and blood vessels. They are generally found only on male ...

s. The males grow their antlers from March to August and the females from June to September, and in both cases the velvet is gone by October. The coat of the caribou is white and thick in the winter. In the summer it becomes short and darker, almost slate-grey in color. The coat is made up of hollow hair which helps to trap warmer air and insulate the caribou. The males become sexually mature after two years and the females after three years. Breeding is in the fall and depends on the female having built up sufficient fat reserves. The

gestation period In mammals, pregnancy is the period of reproduction during which a female carries one or more live offspring from implantation in the uterus through gestation. It begins when a fertilized zygote implants in the female's uterus, and ends once it ...

last for seven to eight months and one calf is produced. Peary caribou feed on most of the available grasses,

Cyperaceae The Cyperaceae are a family of graminoid (grass-like), monocotyledonous flowering plants known as sedges. The family is large, with some 5,500 known species described in about 90 genera, the largest being the "true sedges" genus ''Carex'' w ...

(sedges),

lichen A lichen ( , ) is a composite organism that arises from algae or cyanobacteria living among filaments of multiple fungi species in a mutualistic relationship.mushrooms. In particular they seem to enjoy the purple saxifrage and in summer their muzzles become purple from the plants. Their hooves are sharp and shaped like a shovel to enable them to dig through the snow in search of food. The caribou rarely travel more than from their winter feeding grounds to the summer ones. They are able to outrun the Arctic wolf, their main predator, and are good swimmers. They usually travel in small groups of no more than twelve in the summer and four in the winter. The Peary caribou population has dropped from above 40,000 in 1961 to an estimated 13,000 adults in 2016, according to the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC). During this period, the number of days with above freezing temperatures has increased significantly, resulting in ice layers in the snow pack. These ice layers hinder foraging and are the likely cause for dramatic drops in caribou population in the future. The Peary caribou, called ''tuktu'' in Inuinnaqtun/

Inuktitut Inuktitut (; , syllabics ; from , "person" + , "like", "in the manner of"), also Eastern Canadian Inuktitut, is one of the principal Inuit languages of Canada. It is spoken in all areas north of the tree line, including parts of the provinces o ...

, and written as ''ᕐᑯᑦᓯᑦᑐᒥ ᑐᒃᑐ'' in

Inuktitut syllabics Inuktitut syllabics ( iu, ᖃᓂᐅᔮᖅᐸᐃᑦ, qaniujaaqpait, or , ) is an abugida-type writing system used in Canada by the Inuktitut-speaking Inuit of the territory of Nunavut and the Nunavik and Nunatsiavut regions of Quebec and Labra ...

, is a major food source for the Inuit and was named after the American explorer

Robert Peary Robert Edwin Peary Sr. (; May 6, 1856 – February 20, 1920) was an American explorer and officer in the United States Navy who made several expeditions to the Arctic in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He is best known for, in Apri ...

Morphology

Pelage

During the winter, the fur of the Peary caribou becomes thicker and whiter. In the summer it is shorter and darker. The pelage of the Peary caribou is white in winter and slate-grey with white legs and underparts in summer like the barren-ground caribou in the Dolphin-Union caribou herd. The Dolphin-Union caribou are slightly darker. Like all caribou the hollow hairs help trap warm air and insulate their bodies.

Antlers

The Peary caribou and the Dolphin-Union caribou herd both have light slate-grey antler velvet. The antler velvet of the barren-ground caribou and the boreal woodland caribou are both dark chocolate brown.

Habitat

The Peary caribou may move seasonally up to each way, not necessarily on fixed migration routes that are used habitually, but rather broad migration zones that individuals use to travel from winter ranges to calving areas and summer ranges. They occupy High Arctic islands, including Banks Island, the northwest corner of Victoria Island, Prince of Wales Island, Somerset Island and the

Queen Elizabeth Islands The Queen Elizabeth Islands (french: Îles de la Reine-Élisabeth; formerly Parry Islands or Parry Archipelago) are the northernmost cluster of islands in Canada's Arctic Archipelago, split between Nunavut and the Northwest Territories in Northe ...

. In summer they search for the richest vegetation which is found "on the upper slopes of river valleys and uplands." In the winter, they "inhabit areas where the snow is not too deep such as rugged uplands, beach ridges and rocky outcrops." Aulavik National Park at the northern end of Banks Island is also home to the Peary caribou. The Thomsen River runs through the park and is the northernmost navigable river (by canoe) in North America. Aulavik National Park, a fly-in park, protects about of Arctic lowlands at the northern end of the island. In

Inuvialuktun Inuvialuktun (part of ''Western Canadian Inuit/Inuktitut/Inuktut/Inuktun'') comprises several Inuit language varieties spoken in the northern Northwest Territories by Canadian Inuit who call themselves ''Inuvialuit''. Some dialects and sub-dialec ...

Aulavik means "place where people travel" and caribou have been hunted there for more than 3,400 years, from Pre-Dorset cultures to contemporary Inuvialuit. Archaeologists have found bones of ''pearyi''-sized caribou that occupied Greenland in the Illinoian-Wisconsin interglacial and through the LGM and early Holocene (Meldgaard 1986). Degerbøl (1957) described ''R. t. eogroenlandicus'', a small caribou that became extinct about 1900, from a relict enclave in north-eastern Greenland (Fig. 2). However, Anderson (1946) thought that the small caribou that were occasionally found in northwest Greenland were Peary caribou and implied the same for east Greenland caribou. Bennike (1988), comparing bones and noting that Peary caribou have been documented crossing Nares Strait to Greenland, doubted that ''pearyi'' and ''eogroenlandicus'' were subspecifically distinct. That Peary caribou shared certain mtDNA haplotypes and morphological similarities with it (Kvie et al. 2016) casts further doubt on the validity of ''R. t. eogroenlandicus''. Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit (traditional or community knowledge) records that Peary caribou do, occasionally, cross to Greenland. In any case, the last live caribou reported from northern Greenland were most likely Peary caribou that had strayed from

Ellesmere Island Ellesmere Island ( iu, script=Latn, Umingmak Nuna, lit=land of muskoxen; french: île d'Ellesmere) is Canada's northernmost and List of Canadian islands by area, third largest island, and the List of islands by area, tenth largest in the world. ...

. They were last seen in

Hall Land Hall Land is a peninsula in far northwestern Greenland. It is a part of the Northeast Greenland National Park. Hall Land is one of the coldest places in Greenland. History Hall Land was named after Charles Francis Hall, leader of the 1871 Polar ...

in 1922.

Conservation

It was assigned a status of threatened in April 1979. In May 2004 the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC) listed the Peary caribou as endangered. In 2015, COSEWIC returned the status to threatened, noting:COSEWIC (2015) COSEWIC assessment and status report on the Peary Caribou Rangifer tarandus pearyi in Canada. Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada. Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada, https://wildlife-species.canada.ca/species-risk-registry/virtual_sara/files/cosewic/sr_Peary%20Caribou_2015_e1.pdf, Ottawa, Ontario, 92 pp.

Taxonomy

Originally named ''Rangifer pearyi'' Allen, 1902, it was made a subspecies of barren-ground caribou in 1960 as ''R. arcticus pearyi''. When all caribou and reindeer in the world were made conspecific, the name became ''R. tarandus pearyi''. A recent revision returned the name to ''R. arcticus pearyi''.Harding LE (2022) Available names for Rangifer (Mammalia, Artiodactyla, Cervidae) species and subspecies. ZooKeys 1119: 117-151. doi:10.3897/zookeys.1119.80233.

Footnotes

References

* * * Peary Caribou – Endangered; Barren-Ground Caribou (Dolphin and Union Population) –Special Concern. * * * * * * *

External links

* {{Taxonbar, from=Q1606402 Reindeer Mammals of the Arctic Caribou, Peary Mammals of Canada Endemic fauna of Canada