Reindeer Food and Diet
Generally the diet and eating habit of reindeers varies with the season. The reindeer can adapt to the available foods in particular climatic conditions and this is the main reason why reindeer can survive and manage to grow and feed themselves even in extreme conditions. In winter season reindeers usually eat a special type of plant called lichen. Lichen is composed of two different organisms such as fungus and algae that are mutually beneficial to each other. Lichens are said to be very slow growing but a very ideal and nutritious source of energy for reindeers.
During autumn, when lichen seems to be unpalatable and the mushrooms are abounding, the reindeer’s feed mostly from mushrooms. The appetite of reindeers is this season is quite big. Research says that reindeer can actually consume considerable number of mushrooms during the month of July and August.
It is in summer when the reindeers eat grasses, cotton, leaves and twigs of bushes, bulbs and shoots of shrubs. When reindeers passed to a captive environment that prohibits them to browse for their usual foods they eat alfalfa hay and sometimes herbivorous pellet supplement is added. Reindeers also thrive sometimes on vegetables on this area when there are no other foods available.
Red deer and caribou usually eat their horns after shedding. The reason for this manner is they’re craving for a taste of salt and other mineral substances that are pretty normal for herbivorous animals. Research says that if calcium and other minerals can be eaten from the soil most likely the reindeers will not eat their antlers. When reindeers ate in group there is a remarkable continuous low grunting among the cows, and calves.
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06.06.2006.