page_title: Reindeer distribution
section_title: Porcupine caribou herd
hierarchical_section_title: Reindeer distribution / North America / United States / Alaska / Porcupine caribou herd
caption_attribution_description: English: Caribou, Reindeer in Alaska
context_page_description: The reindeer is a widespread and numerous species in the northern Holarctic, being present in both tundra and taiga. Originally, the reindeer was found in Scandinavia, eastern Europe, Russia, Mongolia, and northern China north of the 50th latitude. In North America, it was found in Canada, Alaska, and the northern conterminous USA from Washington to Maine. In the 19th century, it was apparently still present in southern Idaho. It also occurred naturally on Sakhalin, Greenland, and probably even in historical times in Ireland. During the late Pleistocene era, reindeer were found as far south as Nevada and Tennessee in North America and Spain in Europe. Today, wild reindeer have disappeared from many areas within this large historical range, especially from the southern parts, where it vanished almost everywhere. Populations of wild reindeer are still found in Norway, Finland, Siberia, Greenland, Alaska, and Canada.
  The George River reindeer herd in the tundra of Quebec and Labrador in eastern Canada, once numbered world's largest 8–900,000 animals, stands December 2011 at 74,000 – a drop of up to 92% because of Iron-ore mining, flooding for hydro-power and road-building.
context_section_description: The Porcupine caribou herd is transnational and migratory. The herd is named after their birthing grounds, for example, the Porcupine River, which runs through a large part of the range of the Porcupine herd. Individual herds of migratory caribou once had over a million animals per herd and could take over ten days to cross the Yukon River, but these numbers dramatically declined with habitat disturbance and degradation. Though numbers fluctuate, the herd comprises approximately 169,000 animals (based on a July 2010 photocensus). The Porcupine herd's annual migrations of 1,500 miles (2,400 km) are among the longest of any terrestrial mammal. Its range spans approximately 260,000 km² (64,000,000 acres), from Aklavik, Northwest Territories to Dawson City, Yukon to Kaktovik, Alaska on the Beaufort Sea. The Porcupine caribou or Grant's caribou (Rangifer tarandus granti) is a subspecies with a vast range that includes northeastern Alaska and the Yukon and is therefore cooperatively managed by government agencies and aboriginal peoples from both countries. The Gwich'in people followed the Porcupine herd—their primary source of food, tools, and clothing—for thousands of years—according to oral tradition, for as long as 20,000 years. They continued their nomadic lifestyle until the 1870s. This herd is also traditional food for the Inupiat, the Inuvialuit, the Hän, and the Northern Tutchone. There is currently controversy over whether possible future oil drilling on the coastal plains of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, encompassing much of the Porcupine caribou calving grounds, will have a severe negative impact on the caribou population or whether the caribou population will grow.
  Unlike many other Rangifer tarandus subspecies and their ecotypes, the Porcupine caribou is stable at relatively high numbers, but the 2013 photo census was not counted by January 2014. The peak population in 1989 of 178,000 animals was followed by a decline by 2001 to 123,000. However, by 2010, there was a recovery and an increase to 169,000 animals.
  Many Gwich'in people, who depend on the Porcupine herd, still follow traditional caribou management practices that include a 1981 prohibition against selling caribou meat and limits on the number of caribou to be taken per hunting trip.
caption: Male Porcupine caribou (R. t. granti) in Alaska
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