Reindeer Blog

(Pic - Philip Burgess, Reindeer in downtown Hammerfest) A media fury has erupted in Finnmark surrounding comments by a parliamentary representative Olav Gunnar Ballo who claimed that reindeer herders did not have the right to live and that reindeer husbandry was acting as a brake to development and that as a livelihood ‘it was just [...]

(Pic Barents Observer) With soaring energy prices, alternative energy from domestic sources are increasingly of interest to nation states. Espcially if they are touted as being ‘green’ (low CO2 emissions) and are promoted by state subsidy programs.

(Photo: Mette Randem) International Centre for Reindeer Husbandry Director Anders Oskal accompanied Lars Kullerud (University of the Arctic) and Dagbladet journalist Andreas Viestad and photographer Mette Randem to Salekhard, the capital of the Yamal Nenets Autonomous Okrug. One outcome was the below article on Nenets, reindeer husbandry and food. See below for a Reindeer inspired [...]

According to a story in NRK Sami Radio, 400 reindeer in the Pitea region in Sweden have had to be slaughtered as a result of a mysterious eye disease that has rampaged through a herd which leave afflicted reindeer completely blind.

(Picture / story Russia Today 21042008)Reindeer breeding accounts for 90% of the agriculture in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District in northern Russia. The industry’s export markets include Germany, Italy, Greece and Latvia. But producers are facing logistics problems trying to expand.Reindeer have been the main source of income for the Nenets people for centuries. There are [...]

(Wolverine - Gulo Gulo) The number of reindeer killed by predators rose sharply last year. The Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry reimbursed reindeer herders more than two and a half million euros for lost livestock, the highest figure in 20 years.
The figure was one-fifth higher than the year before. Herders sought recompense for more than [...]

(From CBC North, 03042008) This historical photo from an Iqaluit museum shows Saami with a reindeer on Baffin Island in the 1920s. (Nunatta Sunakkutaangit Museum)
 
A Saami woman from northern Norway has followed the travels of her ancestors to Nunavut, looking for what happened to hundreds of reindeer that were relocated from Norway to Baffin Island [...]

Västerbottens-Kuriren (VK) I fredags eftermiddag stressades en ren till döds utanför Stensele. Enligt spår på platsen verkar det som minst en skoter har kört flera varv runt renen som till slut dött av utmattning.
Ute på isen strax öster om Stensele, i riktning mot Forsvik, har någon eller några skotrar kört varv efter varv runt den [...]

The Russian veterinary service has registered rabies in a group of 46 reindeers which suddenly died this month in a farm in the Komi Republic. According to Rosbaltnord.ru, the 46 animals which died in the “Severny” farm in Usinsk, the Komi Republic, all had rabies. The animals were all part of a bigger herd, which [...]

(Pic: BarentsObserver) On a recent trip to Yamal, the deputy CEO of Gazprom said that Bovanenkovskoe  is on track to start production in 2011. (Об итогах совещания ОАО «Газпром» и Администрации ЯНАО по вопросам взаимодействия при обустройстве Бованенковского месторождения и строительстве системы магистральных газопроводов «Бованенково – Ухта»)
Bovanenkovskoe will be connected by pipeline and more than [...]