The Finns must love their reindeer

February 20, 2014 • 5:36 am

. . . for they coat their antlers with reflective paint to make them visible to oncoming motorists:

Finnish reindeer

 

 

From Time’s newsfeed:

In an attempt to prevent road deaths, reindeer herders in Finland have begun painting the animals’ antlers with fluorescent dye to make them more visible to drivers, the Associated Press reports. The Finnish Reindeer Herder’s Association is currently testing this method to see how the creatures react — and to determine if the dye can withstand Finland’s harsh Arctic climate.

 

Every year, there are between 3,000 and 5,000 accidents involving reindeer in Finland, The Guardian reports. So if this strategy proves successful for the 20 animals who’ve received the makeover so far, herders will apply it as a more widespread solution across the Lapland region, home to around 200,000 reindeer.

 

Previous attempted solutions like reflectors and reflective tape have failed because the reindeer rip them off and then probably eat them or something. And tourists apparently steal reindeer warning signs as souvenirs.

45 thoughts on “The Finns must love their reindeer”

  1. Your headline was probably tongue in cheek, but obviously the point was to save the lives of drivers who hit the damn things.

    1. This woman hit a moose a couple years ago. She described the fact that she drove the whole way to work without remembering any of it as a miracle and I heard interviews where she said “Jesus took the wheel”. No, your brain is cool that way sometimes. You’re just lucky.

    2. Actually, having hit one once in Lapland, I’d say the reindeer may cause some damage to the car, but they are not that big a menace to the passangers inside. Unlike the moose, their center of mass is too low to hit the windshield. Furthermore, the herders are financially quite well compensated for the loss by the state.

      So I do believe there are some humanitarian reasons behind this new light saber practice. Even if the reindeer are herded for food, nobody wants to cause unnecessary deaths of these animals.

      1. It’s a cultural thing.

        Finns in general, like swedes, may find reindeer herding quaint.* And as you say, they aren’t dangerous for people but problematic for cars and trains.

        But the herders are indigenous in the area, and their lifestyle is centered on the herding. So it is protected for better or worse.

        [It should be noted that not all samic groups are herders though. It’s about a 1/3 of them in Sweden, IIRC.]

        * On the other hand the meat kick ass, with suitable sweets and/or sauces. Not as gamey as elk, but not drab either.

          1. I knew a small butcher shop in Stockholm from whom I ordered a large cut of älg (elk) in the beginning of autumn to be frozen and kept for me until Christmas time, which I roasted instead of turkey. Delicious!

  4. And tourists apparently steal reindeer warning signs as souvenirs.

    There is a long-standing tradition in some of the more distant parts of Scotland for modifying the “beware of the sheep on the road signs” … by adding a trunk and big ears, to bring back the mammoths.
    The paint marks are often unsteady, as if applied through a thick haze of the dew of the mountain side.

          1. Not hidden well enough…I saw a documentary about how the Nazis stole it, and then an American archaeologist recovered it in a daring raid. It’s now sitting somewhere in a nondescript Midwestern warehouse….

            b&

      2. For absolute certain, some of the painting is done by organisms bearing only faint resemblance to anatomically normal humans. Often a decidedly odd gait too, as if they’re not used to the gravity.
        You could be onto something. This is almost as interesting as the case of the Bedstead Men (A bootless British river bank remains a shock!)

  8. Reindeers walk on the roads and are as dummy as cows so they easily get killed by cars in the winter time. In the summer they climb up the windy hills escaping mosquitoes. I have once hit a reindeer myself in Lapland.

  9. No, no, no! There’s no selective pressure pushing reindeer to evolve luminescent antlers if humans keep painting them. This is just wrong.

    Cute though.

    Mike.

    1. For evolution to evolve luminescence, they need to be brought to a new environment – something like the deep, dark ocean.

  10. Having hit a deer with my car I know first hand that neither the deer nor the car have a good chance of survival.
    I hope the paint helps and isn’t harmful to the reindeer or any little critters that might nom the antlers, if there are such critters.

  13. And tourists apparently steal reindeer warning signs as souvenirs.

    On behalf of my fellow Americans, I’d like to sincerely offer my apologies to the Fins. That sort of behavior is stupid, dangerous…and all too common.

    Might I suggest, though, as a practical means to ameliorate the situation? Sell the signs cheaply at tourist traps, including the airport. They don’t even have to be the real deal; life-sized plastic-laminated cardboard would do the trick. Maybe also offer some upscale versions made out of ABS plastic, too.

    And stuff the packaging with some “fun facts about reindeer,” especially including the number of cars totaled by running into them.

    Cheers,

    b&

  15. This can’t be a real story. For one they shed their antlers every year so it would be futile to paint them all and then again next year. It this an Onion story?

    Now, I could see a rancher painting a few dozen of his deer every year, but 200,000 do the math.

    1. I was thinking along similar lines, quite labor intensive to do this each year. OTOH, I saw a couple of wolves at AutoZone picking up a set of high beams.

    2. OK, let’s do the math: reindeerherding.org says there are about 5,000 herders in Finland, so 200,000 animals divided by 5,000 herders makes 40 animals each. That sounds plausible (lacking further information either way on how tractable the reindeer are).

      1. And all you’d need would be a couple of spray cans of luminous paint (per 40 reindeer)

      2. Depending on how long the paint lasts, the woods (or tundra or whatever) would look pretty psychedelic after a few years.

      3. As someone born in Lapland: the things are herded together one or two times a year in any case.

        They’re chased with snowmobiles, ATVs, even helicopters, and collected in pens, where the young ones get their owner’s markings to recognize them, and a portion is selected for slaughter (yeah, this is an industry). During that time, it probably wouldn’t be that much work to spray paint the antlers too.

        To make things easier, the paint would basically only be needed during the winter months. During the summer, the sun doesn’t set, so reflectors are not that useful.

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