‘Slay-Bells’ Ring for Dasher, Dancer, Prancer and Vixen

Git along little reindeer. This fall in western Alaska, reindeer herders are celebrating the centennial of their small and rapidly changing industry.

Reindeer were brought to Alaska from Siberia in 1891 to provide meat for Native villages, and they still do that. But they also feed an international market for antlers, and herders are anxious to capitalize on a demand for meat that now reaches even mainstream outlets such as Domino’s Pizza.

Today’s Eskimo herders use helicopters, snowmobiles and all-terrain vehicles to round up the animals, and some use computers to keep track of each animal, its weight and age.

But their results still are limited by western Alaska’s remoteness and fragile terrain. Few can get their meat to slaughterhouses for inspection--a key to reaching new markets. Many must do their butchering in areas without plumbing, relying on the weather to freeze the carcasses.

In addition, the arctic tundra cannot support too many more reindeer than the 37,300 already in the state.

Reserved by law for Native Alaskans since 1937, herding is in the hands of a dozen or so individuals, plus a couple villages with community herds.

“I run the herd and my family lives on it,” said Clifford Weyiouanna, 49, of the Bering Sea coastal village of Shishmaref. “It’s sort of like a farm in the Lower 48.”

Sort of. Except that one reindeer herder’s range can cover more than a million acres of unfenced tundra--swampy and mosquito-rich in summer and bitter cold in winter. Sometimes caribou herds come through and take the reindeer with them--for good.

“You have to set your heart to do it,” said Larry Davis of Nome. “It’s hard work is all I can say.”

Davis’ 5,000 to 6,000 animals make him the largest private herder in the state, probably in the world. He has been herding reindeer for a quarter of a century, ever since he borrowed 365 animals from the Bureau of Indian Affairs to get his start.

Three years ago, Davis became the only herder to own his own helicopter. Each June he hires a pilot to round up his reindeer so their antlers can be cut in his Nome corral.

The antler is sold in the Orient, where it is said to have healing and aphrodisiac powers. Antlers have become the most valuable part of the reindeer, and the June roundups are a crucial time for herders; Weyiouanna says he gets up to $46 a pound for antlers.

In the fall, herders round up their animals again--each herd identified by notches and tags on their ears--and butcher some for meat. Workers usually are paid with meat, and most of it never leaves northwest Alaska.

“We raise the herds up here for the intent they were brought over 100 years ago--providing food for the villages. It’s the cheapest source of red meat for the villages,” Weyiouanna said.

A century ago, the Rev. Sheldon Jackson, general agent for education in Alaska, arranged to have 16 reindeer brought from Siberia to the Aleutian Islands as an experiment because he was afraid Native Alaskans might starve.

The next year, Jackson arranged to ship 171 reindeer to the Seward Peninsula, and shipments continued until there were 10,000 head in Alaska by 1905. Siberian and Lapp herders also were brought in to teach Alaskans.

The reindeer thrived, and by 1932 numbered a whopping 641,000. The population plummeted to just 25,000 in 1950 because of overgrazing, disease, dried-up markets and other problems.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs now keeps the herds in trust, leasing reindeer to Natives who want to start herds. The agency also gives money to some nonprofit native corporations to fund reindeer herding, and any profits herders make are tax-free.

As for the meat, there was no federal inspection until a couple of years ago, and most reindeer meat remains uninspected. But only meat meeting U.S. Department of Agriculture inspection guidelines will be used by many sausage manufacturers and other more discriminating buyers.

The state has an inspected slaughterhouse in Palmer, 550 miles from Nome, from which Alaska Sausage Co. in Anchorage and other large buyers get meat.

“So far I’ve been buying all they can produce,” said Herbert Eckmann, president of Alaska Sausage. This year the firm sold sausage to Domino’s for a reindeer pizza pilot project in Alaska.

Another inspected plant opened on Nunivak Island this spring, but together the two plants butchered fewer than a thousand animals in the last year.

Davis flies 50 live reindeer at a time to Anchorage in specially devised crates, then trucks them to the Palmer plant at a cost of about $10,000 per shipment and untold stress to the animals.

But most herders simply can’t get their animals there, and conditions at home don’t lend themselves to federal inspection standards.