ryvita - The Cairngorm Reindeer Herd

With Christmas over and the Centre closed to the public for a month, we have put all of our reindeer out to free-range – the males are on the Cromdale mountains and the females are split between there and the Cairngorm mountains. We don’t necessarily see them every day, but where possible we like to catch up with them, feed them and check everyone’s ok. Here’s some photos from feeding the herd the other day:

The herd approaching – they had come to call from the summit of the mountain just to the left of centre.

We sometimes feed the herd within the top part of our hill enclosure, out of the way of dogs, and leave the gate open for them to leave when they want to.

We always let the calves get “first dibs” and a crowd of impatient mini-reindeer gather round the bags.

We also use a small bag of feed to go round any of the older or skinnier adults to give them a “top up”. Here is Suidhe, a 3-year-old female, having an extra snack.

At nearly 16 years old, Fonn is one of the oldest reindeer in the herd. She still looks great!

11-year-old Meadow is missing the tips of her ears, and looks even stranger now she’s cast her antlers.

Blondie is one of the most recognizable reindeer in the herd.

Little Galilee is very sweet natured. She’s nearly 5 years old but quite small for her age.

Parmesan (with the white nose) and daughter Blyton are still close, even now Blyton is nearly 2 years old.

Not bad for a place to live, but where is the snow?!?

Andi

Some of you may already know this female reindeer, Ryvita. If you don’t then she is a 7 year old mature female who has a lovely nature and, like most the other reindeer in the herd, is super greedy! Over the past three years she has had her daughter Cheese by her side as she hasn’t calved since she had her in 2013, so the two of them are inseparable. Not sure what will happen if Ryvita has a calf this year… Poor Cheese! However this blog is not about the relationship between Ryvita and Cheese, it is about antler growth. Over the past month I have been taking photos of Ryvita to show you all how fast reindeer antler grows. Antler is in fact the fastest growing animal tissue in the world.

I started taking my photos on the 17^th April 2016 and took the last one on the 22^nd of May 2016 and in that time I reckon her antlers have grown a good 8-10 inches and also a 4-5 inch front point, so it really is phenomenal. We think Ryvita is still due to calve so she’s also growing her calf inside her, and is doing a fantastic job of both. The photos speak for themselves so I hope you enjoy them. Note that we had snow, then a lovely sunny spell, then another good dump of snow again… Got to love an unpredictable Scottish spring!

170416 — Ryvita on the 17th of April, just beginning her antler growth

240416 — One week later, the 24th of April, in beautiful sunshine

280416 — A few days later, the 28th of April, and we have snow!

080516 — Ryvita on the 8th of May, I think she’s bored of being our model!

220516 — And finally, Ryvita on the 22nd of May

Ryvita’s antlers will continue to grow until the onset of autumn, so hopefully she gets lots to eat and she will hopefully grow a rather lovely set of antlers.

Here’s a quick side by side comparison of 17th April to 17th May, just one month of growth:

Fiona

Tag: ryvita

Feeding the Free-rangers

My, how you’ve grown!