Browsing by Subject "zoo"

The wild forest reindeer (Rangifer tarandus fennicus) is one of the two native reindeer subspecies in Finland. The other one is semi-domesticated reindeer (Rangifer tarandus tarandus), which is a common livestock species in Lapland. A total of 22 zoos hold wild forest reindeer in Europe. These individuals along with individuals from the wild population are the base of a reintroduction program implemented in central Finland. The objective of this thesis is to shed light on the diet of wild forest reindeer in the wild and in captivity. From individuals in the wild and in reintroduction enclosures, a total of 17 fecal samples were collected. The samples were analyzed with DNA metabarcoding technique to determine the diet. The samples were analyzed at the Institute of Biotechnology and the obtained sequences were identified as plant genera with NCBI BLAST. The data was grouped according to sampling date and snow coverage to two groups and according to sampling site to two groups. The genera were assigned under types. 17 zoos submitted their feeding guideline of wild forest reindeer for the study. These were analyzed to obtain data about the different food item types corresponding to the types of plant genera found from the fecal samples. Fecal sample results were compared as frequencies of sequence reads assigned to genera and types. The most frequent types in the whole data was forbs and shrubs (42,1 %) and deciduous trees (38,9 %). The biggest differences were in the two groups when the data was grouped according to season. Differences were less prominent in the locationally grouped data. In the feeding guidelines from zoos, most of them (94 %) stated feeding deciduous trees and almost as many (88 %) stated feeding graminoids. In the fecal sample data, graminoids accounted for only 0,5 % of the sequence reads. The wild forest reindeer diets in the wild seem to have seasonal variation and not so much locational variation. The captive forest reindeer diets could be advanced with increasing the amount of forbs and shrubs offered and decreasing the amount of graminoids. The small sample size of 17 makes the results of this study indicative at best and further research is needed.