How many baby Reindeers are in a litter?
A Reindeer (Rangifer tarandus) usually gives birth to around 2 babies.
Each of those little ones spend around 222 days as a fetus before they are released into the wild. Upon birth, they weight 5.5 kg (12.12 lbs) and measure 15 cm (0′ 6″). They are a member of the Cervidae family (genus: Rangifer). An adult Reindeer grows up to a size of 2.23 meter (7′ 4″).
To have a reference: Humans obviously usually have a litter size of one ;). Their babies are in the womb of their mother for 280 days (40 weeks) and reach an average size of 1.65m (5′ 5″). They weight in at 62 kg (137 lbs), which is obviously highly individual, and reach an average age of 75 years.
The reindeer (Rangifer tarandus), also known as the caribou in North America, is a species of deer with circumpolar distribution, native to Arctic, sub-Arctic, tundra, boreal, and mountainous regions of northern Europe, Siberia, and North America. This includes both sedentary and migratory populations. Rangifer herd size varies greatly in different geographic regions. The Taimyr herd of migrating Siberian tundra reindeer (R. t. sibiricus) in Russia is the largest wild reindeer herd in the world, varying between 400,000 and 1,000,000. What was once the second largest herd is the migratory boreal woodland caribou (R. t. caribou) George River herd in Canada, with former variations between 28,000 and 385,000. As of January 2018, there are fewer than 9,000 animals estimated to be left in the George River herd, as reported by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. The New York Times reported in April 2018 of the disappearance of the only herd of southern mountain caribou in the lower 48 states, with an expert calling it “functionally extinct” after the herd’s size dwindled to a mere three animals.Rangifer varies in size and colour from the smallest, the Svalbard reindeer, to the largest, the boreal woodland caribou. The North American range of caribou extends from Alaska through Yukon, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut into the boreal forest and south through the Canadian Rockies and the Columbia and Selkirk Mountains. The barren-ground caribou, Porcupine caribou, and Peary caribou live in the tundra, while the shy boreal woodland caribou prefer the boreal forest. The Porcupine caribou and the barren-ground caribou form large herds and undertake lengthy seasonal migrations from birthing grounds to summer and winter feeding grounds in the tundra and taiga. The migrations of Porcupine caribou herds are among the longest of any mammal. Barren-ground caribou are also found in Kitaa in Greenland, but the larger herds are in Alaska, the Northwest Territories, and Nunavut.Some subspecies are rare and at least one has already become extinct: the Queen Charlotte Islands caribou of Canada. Historically, the range of the sedentary boreal woodland caribou covered more than half of Canada and into the northern States in the U.S. Woodland caribou have disappeared from most of their original southern range and were designated as threatened in 2002 by the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC). Environment Canada reported in 2011 that there were approximately 34,000 boreal woodland caribou in 51 ranges remaining in Canada.(Environment Canada, 2011b). Siberian tundra reindeer herds are in decline, and Rangifer tarandus is considered to be vulnerable by the IUCN.Arctic peoples have depended on caribou for food, clothing, and shelter, such as the Caribou Inuit, the inland-dwelling Inuit of the Kivalliq Region in northern Canada, the Caribou Clan in Yukon, the Inupiat, the Inuvialuit, the Hän, the Northern Tutchone, and the Gwich’in (who followed the Porcupine caribou for millennia). Hunting wild reindeer and herding of semi-domesticated reindeer are important to several Arctic and sub-Arctic peoples such as the Duhalar for meat, hides, antlers, milk, and transportation. The Sami people (Sápmi) have also depended on reindeer herding and fishing for centuries. In Sápmi, reindeer pull pulks.Male and female reindeer can grow antlers annually, although the proportion of females that grow antlers varies greatly between population and season. Antlers are typically larger on males. In traditional festive legend, Santa Claus’s reindeer pull a sleigh through the night sky to help Santa Claus deliver gifts to good children on Christmas Eve.
Other animals of the family Cervidae
Reindeer is a member of the Cervidae, as are these animals:
- Père David’s deer with 1 babies per pregnancy
- Taruca with 1 babies per pregnancy
- Chital with 1 babies per pregnancy
- Mérida brocket weighting around 16.5 kilograms (36.38 lbs)
- Tufted deer with 1 babies per pregnancy
- Water deer with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Roosevelt’s muntjac with 1 babies per pregnancy
- Visayan spotted deer weighting around 45.8 kilograms (100.97 lbs)
- Pudú with 1 babies per pregnancy
- Thorold’s deer with 1 babies per pregnancy
Animals that share a litter size with Reindeer
Those animals also give birth to 2 babies at once:
- Common rock rat
- Highland streaked tenrec
- Epixerus
- Ord’s kangaroo rat
- Spotted hyena
- Red-legged sun squirrel
- Javan mongoose
- Little pied bat
- Javanese flying squirrel
- Slender mongoose
Animals that get as old as a Reindeer
Other animals that usually reach the age of 20.17 years:
- Hartebeest with 20 years
- Scimitar oryx with 20.42 years
- Chital with 20.75 years
- Egyptian fruit bat with 22.83 years
- Ocelot with 20.25 years
- Dama gazelle with 17.25 years
- Northern viscacha with 19.5 years
- Mohol bushbaby with 16.5 years
- Nilgai with 21.67 years
- Common vampire bat with 19.5 years
Animals with the same weight as a Reindeer
What other animals weight around 108.73 kg (239.7 lbs)?
- Rough-toothed dolphin usually reaching 130 kgs (286.6 lbs)
- Atlantic humpback dolphin usually reaching 100 kgs (220.46 lbs)
- Schomburgk’s deer usually reaching 106 kgs (233.69 lbs)
- Southern right whale dolphin usually reaching 116 kgs (255.74 lbs)
- Atlantic spotted dolphin usually reaching 110 kgs (242.51 lbs)
- Lesser kudu usually reaching 93.81 kgs (206.82 lbs)
- Amazon river dolphin usually reaching 121.22 kgs (267.24 lbs)
- Juan Fernández fur seal usually reaching 95 kgs (209.44 lbs)
- Pacific white-sided dolphin usually reaching 109.85 kgs (242.18 lbs)
- Naemorhedus sumatraensis usually reaching 110 kgs (242.51 lbs)
Animals with the same size as a Reindeer
Also reaching around 2.23 meter (7′ 4″) in size do these animals:
- Pacific white-sided dolphin gets as big as 2.21 meter (7′ 3″)
- Red deer gets as big as 2.14 meter (7′ 1″)
- Hawaiian monk seal gets as big as 2.24 meter (7′ 5″)
- California sea lion gets as big as 2.02 meter (6′ 8″)
- Polar bear gets as big as 2 meter (6′ 7″)
- Mountain nyala gets as big as 2.25 meter (7′ 5″)
- Pantropical spotted dolphin gets as big as 2.14 meter (7′ 1″)
- Hooded seal gets as big as 2.33 meter (7′ 8″)
- Okapi gets as big as 2 meter (6′ 7″)
- White rhinoceros gets as big as 2.59 meter (8′ 6″)