Sapien Stories: The Norwegian Reindeer Herders

Aisha Moon
Nov 14, 2024
9 min read

The Renideers and the Norwegian Tribe, The Samis

A passel of rain deers speeding through the snow-garbed valley is a common sight of the Komsa mountain in Finmark. To an outsider, these swift and zaftig animals bring alive the memories of Christmas nights and age-old fairy tales- a flash flood of nostalgia drenched in childhood innocence and joy. To watch these animals against the Nordic expanse of snow, indeed, is a moment of perpetuity, relishable only in silent awe. The rain deer herders of Norway have no such romanticism attached to these fascinating creatures or their vocation connected to them. They herd reindeer, live off them, and possess them as the material markers of wealth. However, they, too, have a unique spiritual bond with these animals, for embedded, they both are in an eternal web of mutual dependence.

Samis inhabit Lapland (the northernmost region of Finland bordering the Gulf of Bothnia, Ostrobothnia, Norrbotten of Sweden, Troms and Finnmark Counties of Norway, and the Republic of Karelia and Murmansk Oblast of Russia) and its neighbouring places in Finland, Norway, Sweden and Russia. There is a debate among historians on whether Samis are paleo-Siberian or Alpine. Earlier, they hunted reindeer and only kept them domesticated in small packs. Later on, they turned into nomadic herders, fishing and hunting as they migrated from one place to another across the vast expanses of these Scandinavian countries. Recent times saw these people again mostly settle down, abandoning their nomadic lifestyle and building permanent housing.

Sometimes, the Sami are called the “White Indians of Scandinavia”. The Sami lore tells the tale of the Great Creator, who put the heart of a two-year-old reindeer cow in the ground when he created the Sami people. The belief is that whenever the Sami people are in trouble, they just need to put their ears to the ground and listen to the heartbeats of the reindeer heart. If the heart is still beating, it is believed the Sami people have nothing to fear. For the Sami people, the beating of their drums is synonymous with the beating of the reindeer’s heart, a rhythm so ancient and primal, of eternal optimism and hope for the future of the people.

Samis also were the boat builders for the Vikings and the Shamans, whom even the Vikings looked up to with reverence.

History of Reindeer Herding

The encyclopedia defines herding as the practice of caring for roaming groups of livestock over a large area. Of all the herders of the world, the reindeer herders of Norway evoke the most numinous charm. Finnmark, a part of Northern Norway, is home to these nomadic herders belonging to the Sami tribe.

These Norwegian rain deer herders have been at it since the 17th century. The life of the Sami can be divided into the times before the colonial turf wars and after them. Before the colonisers came, the Samis co-existed with nature and depended on reindeer for their food, milk, travel, goods movement, and clothing needs.

The 3500-year-old metier of reindeer herding has a recent history riven by development and nation-building. When countries such as Sweden and Russia began to expand their territories, the Samis made a treaty with them, the border with Sweden was determined in 1751 and with Russia in 1826. Christian missionaries began their work in the Lapland during the 18th century, which resulted in a combination of the native religion of the Samis and an orthodox version of Christianity emerging and was named Laestadianism.

This destroyed the ancient Sami religion to a great extent; they abandoned their deities, the Sieidi rock formations that they worshipped as sources of power, and the Sami drums. Still, the Sami traditional songs such as Yokis began to gain popularity from the 19th century onwards, retaining the memories of a culture long gone and forgotten through intrusion and colonisation.

When Finland, Sweden, and Norway became independent nations in the 17th century, their governments began to put taxes on reindeer herding. The tax burden brought drastic changes in the Sami approach to herding. This vocation for them was all about livelihood until then. A new perspective based on wealth creation emerged slowly as the taxes were to be paid in money, unlike in the self-reliant food-housing-and-clothing-based economic system they had. Reindeer herding essentially was about coexisting with nature, but now it is a commercial activity. Thus also began the era of organised reindeer herding using modern vehicles, equipment, and more of a husbandry approach.

Reindeer Migration

The Samis used to own land collectively, and they used to have little sense of ownership over the abundant landscape they were surrounded with. There were pasture lands assigned to each family just to graze reindeer. There still is an unwritten code in force by which one herder will not encroach on the land assigned to another. Each of the herds travels the same migration routes year after year, accompanied by their owners and their families. The Samis do not discriminate by gender in their herding practices. Neither women nor children stay at home when the migratory season sets in. Come another season, single families and families together hit the trail of this drawn-out expedition. Sledges drawn by reindeer and skis pulled by them help the herders keep pace with their animals and prevent them from straying. Members of each herd have distinct earmarks, made when they are calves, to identify the herd to which they belong.

Spring and summer seasons witness the herders move to coastal destinations, and during autumn and winter, they go back to the inland regions. The Norwegian Norsk rikskringkasting AS or the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (NRK) telecasts these migrations live 24 x 7. For the broadcasting company, this project was a great challenge, and this could have been why they named it “The Impossible Project”. The live video recording faced many obstacles. There was only limited satellite coverage in many of the remote locations of the migration path. The company placed huge mirrors on mountaintops and bounced off the satellite signals to boost them. Helicopters, drones, and snowmobiles were used to cover the entire herd, which is usually of the size of 1000 to 2000. The live show was endearing to the entire herd of viewers as they stared wonder-struck and up close into the huge black eyes of the reindeer and the stunning backdrop of white snow till the horizon.

The migration in the Spring season is somewhat initiated by a female reindeer of the herd- the one who has the most magnificent set of antlers. She makes the magnificent first move, and until then, all others stay rooted to the spot. During the entire migratory journey, the reindeer herds would stop for a 1-3 hour power nap after every 6 hours of the walk. A summer tourist, to great awe and surprise, could witness the reindeer herds swimming to coastal islands through the sea. Yeah, they are good swimmers too. The calving of reindeer also takes place in summer.

Reindeer Herding Dogs

Modern life has not left the Samis untouched. Nowadays, the herders use snowmobiles, snow scooters, and helicopters to round up and watch their reindeer. One age-old practice that remains is the herders still use dogs. These herding dogs belong to three different breeds. The Swedish Lapphund is an indigenous dog breed and a close family to the world-popular Spitz breed. Lapphund dogs are usually black and easily spotted on snow. They have a loud bark as they communicate with the herders by responding to the “dog language” spoken uniquely by the Samis. It is a single-toned shout that is made to oscillate as the Samis move their hand across their mouth while making it. The Laponian Herder and the Finnish Lapphund are the other two breeds of dogs employed in Reindeer herding. These are dog breeds that love hard work.

Reindeer Lichen

In winter, when grass and other food become scarce, the herds are divided into smaller packs and made to graze in different parts of the mountains. Lichen is the staple food of reindeer in winter, and it is a group of species known as reindeer lichen that they eat most. The name, reindeer lichen, stands for a lichen that is eaten by the reindeer, and incidentally, the same lichen looks like a reindeer horn, greyish white and branching out intricately. A lichen is a symbiotic combination of a fungus and an alga. The alga carries out photosynthesis for the fungus, and the fungus supplies the alga with moisture and minerals.

In the snow-covered winters, the reindeer create craters in ice by kicking with their feet and feast on the lichens underneath, a technique of food gathering unknown to other deer species. The reindeer also eats leaves, grass, a small-sized rodent species called lemmings, and even bird eggs and mushrooms. The lichens they eat have complex-structured carbohydrates in them, and only the enzymes in the stomach of the reindeer can break them down and digest them. Humans cannot digest these lichens. However, the Samis sometimes used to eat the partially digested lichens harvested from the stomach of a freshly killed reindeer. The native tribes used to cook these lichens along with reindeer blood and meat.

reindeer herder — source: intercontinentalcry.org

Snow, Snow, Snow

Snow is the essence of the Sami life. Snow governs all aspects of their nomadic existence. They call ice and snow by many names, with a vocabulary of about 200 words. Speaking of which, the languages Arabic, Sanskrit, and the Sami language have one thing in common- they have the dual form of the noun and the verb. For example, if one is talking about apples, these languages have a form of the noun and a corresponding verb form to represent ‘two apples’. The Sami chants resemble Sanskrit chants in intonation and sound. There are more than 10 Sami dialects.

The word ‘Seanas’ in the Sami language means the dry kind of snow that has large grains with water locked in it. This snow is seen during the spring season and in late winter, too. ‘Muohtti’ means snowfall, borgo is snowdrift, 'bulzi' is a crust of snow on a tree branch or a tool, 'cuohki' is the crust of ice on a pasture, 'earbmi' is the snow falling with light snowflakes, 'bearta' is the weather after snowing when the snow becomes compact, 'vahca' is new powdery snow, and 'slavzi' is the utterly drenching wet snow. The Sami understanding of snow is ingrained with a deep ecological awareness that might not even be comprehended by outsiders easily. Though not a nation themselves, the Samis have a flag of their own. Red, green, yellow, and blue, the colours of this flag, are also prominent in the Sami traditional attire.

The Sami Life

The expert reindeer herder knows how to keep the herd in good shape and to the best use. For this, some males are castrated, some animals are periodically set aside for culling and the production of meat, some are turned into draft animals, and the total number of reindeer in a herd is kept proportionate to the size of the pasture land. The life span of a reindeer is 10 to 15 years. The male sheds its antlers after the rut while the females keep them through winter, and the pregnant ones drop them only after calving.

The Samis believe that the reindeer antlers have a direct connection with heaven and, hence, are sacred. They hang antlers above their places of worship.

A Sami shaman would wear antlers on his or her head. Some Sami tribes even believe that they descended from the reindeer. Killing a reindeer for meat was a ritualistic and rarely chosen deed for the earlier Sami, but now the meat industry has taken over, resulting in mindless slaughter. The parts of the body of a reindeer that the Sami would have preserved for other uses- such as making boots and knitting- nowadays are discarded and thrown away in slaughterhouses. The fur was used to make clothes, and the antlers were modified into tools and handicrafts by the Samis. For the modern reindeer herder, there is too much competition, government control, industry demands, shrinking of pastoral lands, taxes, and a change of speed brought about by automated herding to cope with. What ensues is an age-old tradition with all its ecological nuances disappearing into a labyrinth of sheer commerce and market rules.

Threats that Reindeer Herders Face: Climate to Mining

Climate change is another threat that looms over the lives of the Samis and their reindeer. Arctic temperatures are rising because of global warming. Colonising trees such as Dwarf Birch and Willow have taken advantage of the early spring and late winter induced by global warming. Nowadays, these invasive species flourish in the Norwegian forests as well as the Tundra. These trees have become a threat to the natural vegetation. The texture of the snow on the ground is also changing, thereby making it difficult for the herders to find their herds by following their foottracks on the snow. A warmer climate produces thicker layers of snow, making it difficult for reindeer to dig out lichens in winter. Large-scale mining and tourism operations are also encroaching upon and shrinking the pastoral lands of the reindeer.

The World of the Reindeer

Other than in Norway, there are reindeer herders in Finland, Sweden, Russia, Greenland, Alaska, Mongolia, China, and Canada. The Siberian reindeer herders are similar to the Norwegian reindeer herders in the extreme weather they both have to cope with. The Arctic, Eurasia, Mongolia, and North China are the natural habitats in which reindeer and herders thrive. There are seven different species of reindeer- Eurasian Tundra Reindeer, Svalbard Reindeer, Eurasian Forest Reindeer, Alaskan Caribou, Woodland Caribou, Barren-ground Caribou, and Peary Caribou. Smoked reindeer heart is a gourmet delight in Sweden. Grilled reindeer, reindeer tartare, and reindeer salami are also there to tempt the taste buds of newcomers to the Scandinavian world of snow.

Time and change cannot be stopped, but they could be adapted to the best for the life of earth-for both humans and other life forms. To leave an ecological breathing ambit for the Samis and the reindeer is the least the world could do to help them survive.