As for the foot click--a presumptive means of communication (_cf._
Seton, 1929, +3+: 69; Jacobi, 1931: 212-216)--I must confess that I was
always so engrossed with photography whenever the Caribou were close
at hand (up to within a dozen feet) that I had no thought of this
phenomenon and did not detect it.
_References._--Richardson, 1829: 242; A. J. Stone, 1900: 53;
Preble, 1902: 42; Seton, 1929, +3+: 105; Murie, 1939: 245;
Harper, 1949: 230; Banfield, 1951a: 19, 27.
_Food_
The ground lichens (including the various species of _Cladonia_) in the
Windy River area in 1947 did not seem, for the most part, to have a
height of more than 2 or 3 inches. The average length of several local
specimens of _Cladonia_ is approximately 51 mm. This condition was in
considerable contrast to the great spongy masses I had noted in the
Tazin River basin, between Athabaska and Great Slave lakes, in 1914.
I have no means of knowing whether the condition in Keewatin represented
severe cropping by Caribou in past years and subsequent slow recovery,
or whether it is a normal condition. According to Charles Schweder, the
growth depends upon rain, and so varies from year to year. During the
warmer months, from June to September, the local Caribou seemed to me to
be feeding very largely on the higher vegetation, such as willow, dwarf
birch, alder, and sedges. I had no definite evidence of their consuming
lichens during that period. By early October the species of _Cladonia_
seemed to have attained a somewhat fuller growth than they had exhibited
several months previously. Perez-Llano discusses (1944: 29-30) the
utilization by Reindeer of various lichens. Dix has reported (1951) on a
collection of lichens from the Windy River area.
Some miscellaneous observations along Windy and Little rivers follow:
June 16, 20 Caribou feeding apparently on patches of crowberry
(_Empetrum_) and dwarf birch (_Betula glandulosa_) on a ridge; June 29,
a Caribou feeding apparently on dwarf birches; June 30, a buck grazing
in a sedge bog; August 26, several bucks browsing on willow tops
(probably _Salix planifolia_) in a riverside thicket, and some does on
dwarf birch and perhaps tall grass or low willow; August 27, numbers
feeding largely on willow and dwarf birch; August 28 and 30, low alders,
willow, and dwarf birches nibbled off. By early October the leaves of
the three last-mentioned shrubs were no longer available, having dropped
off. During the summer they had seemed to be preferred above the
lichens. Cabot has remarked (1912: 46) on the fondness of _Rangifer
arcticus caboti_ for dwarf birch in Labrador.
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