“Golden Fleece” from the Far North
By “Awake!” correspondent in Canada
FROM the treeless Arctic tundra and snowfields comes what some believe is the world’s finest wool, surpassing that from the Kashmir goat. From what animal is such “golden fleece” obtained? Why, from the musk ox, also called the polar ox. Eskimos call it by another name, umingmaq, meaning the “bearded one,” because the musk ox’s chocolate-brown hair hangs down over his entire body, giving him a shaggy appearance.
But it is not this outer hair that is the source of such fine fleece. The musk ox has concealed under his long-hair coat a thick undergarment of exquisite, silky wool that is shed in summer.
It is this wool undercoat that keeps the musk ox impervious to the extreme winter cold of his northern habitat. Thus, even though his body temperature always stays around 100 degrees Fahrenheit none of this heat escapes to melt the snow when he lies down.
Physical Characteristics
Mr. Musk Ox has a short neck and a large head, and he may weigh some 800 pounds. He has massive, sharp-pointed horns that curve downward and then hook upward at the tip. The cows and young also have horns, but they are smaller in size. Because of these formidable horns one Arctic explorer called the musk ox the “world’s most dangerous game animal.”
Though the musk ox has short, stout legs, he is agile and travels faster than a man can run. His white-stockinged legs end in wide split hoofs especially designed to make them sure-footed when climbing rocky prominences. The rim of the hoof has a sharp cutting edge useful for pawing through the shallow, frozen snow cover on windswept slopes to reach the sparse grass and low-growing plants on which they feed.
The musk ox is not really an ox but is a relative of the chamois of Europe, and so is a kind of goat antelope. Unlike the musk deer, the musk ox does not really have specialized musk glands. But during the breeding season, the males do give off a musklike odor.
The Creator of all living things has amply provided for the musk ox in the harsh climate in which he thrives. On Ellesmere Island in the high Arctic where about 4,000 of them live, sunlight is absent from November to the end of February. Interestingly, the musk ox’s eyes are equipped with an abundance of large, sensory rods for night vision. On the other hand, for the long days of Arctic summer he has built-in sunglasses! The pupils of his eyes, rectangular in shape, can close to the tiniest slit, reminding one of the wooden sunglasses with only very narrow slits in the center that Eskimo people once made to protect their eyes from snow blindness.
During a storm, a herd of musk oxen crowd together with hindquarters to the wind, sheltering the calves within a furry fence. They will sometimes stand together for days, as long as the storm is blowing, their massive bodies protecting the calves.
Return from Near Extinction
In years past the greatest enemy of the musk ox has been man. With the advent of firearms, these placid animals could be killed as simply as one could shoot cows in a pasture. How so?
Well, when threatened with attack, whether from humans or Arctic wolves, the mature animals take a somewhat similar defensive position as when they are combating the elements. The older bulls and cows face outward in a “hedgehog” formation with their long, curved horns lowered, ready for business, while the calves and younger animals are protected in the center.
This defensive posture presents a formidable flank of horns and is highly effective against wolves. But their defense makes them “sitting ducks” for men with high-powered rifles. In the latter half of the nineteenth century, the shaggy pelt of the musk ox was much in demand for carriage robes. In one five-year period, 14,000 oxen were gunned down by hunters who received $50 per pelt from a fur-trading company.
Hundreds of thousands of these rugged animals once roamed Arctic lands from Alaska through northern Canada and its islands, as well as Greenland, northern Europe and Siberia. By the turn of the century their herds had been reduced until it seemed that they might join the dodo bird in extinction. For a time only about five hundred grazed the Arctic tundra.
In 1917 the Canadian government put a ban on the killing of musk oxen. The small herds left on Arctic islands have increased to 8,500 and, according to the latest count, some 1,500 roam the mainland.
“Golden Fleece of the Arctic”
Every spring the musk ox begins to shed his wool undergarment in such great quantities that early explorers were astonished to see the low bushes and shrubs of the tundra festooned with masses of what looked like filmy cobwebs. This wool has been called the “golden fleece of the Arctic.” One pound of it, spun into a forty-strand thread, will stretch for twenty-five miles!
Some authorities think that musk ox fleece even exceeds cashmere wool in quality. Only four ounces of this “golden fleece” is required to make a featherweight sweater, yet it will keep a man comfortable even in the coldest weather. This “golden fleece of the Arctic” is valued at anywhere from $35 to $50 a pound.
Domestication
As far back as 1880 the suggestion was made that perhaps musk oxen could be domesticated. Thus they would be a source of large amounts of milk and meat. However, in recent decades it was realized that such use of the animals would be like ‘killing the goose that laid the golden egg,’ because great possibilities were seen in the use of the warm woolen undergarment.
The need to provide Eskimo people with some kind of employment, combined with a potential market for musk ox wool, sparked a domestication program. In 1954 a small pilot herd of young animals was transported to a farm in the state of Vermont for experimental purposes. The objective was to determine whether the musk ox would submit to human herd management.
The captured calves quickly learned that their human captors were not too hard to get along with. They soon recognized that pangs of hunger could be appeased by cooperating with their keepers. It did not take long before they realized what fences were, although one bull began testing out his youthful strength against the fence posts, breaking them regularly. Finally a concrete post was installed, and it took just one butting episode to cure his mania.
In captivity the females produce offspring yearly instead of only one calf every two years as in their wild state. The domesticated musk ox is sleeker in appearance owing to the care that the keepers give their shaggy coats.
Each season wool is lifted, not sheared off them, eliminating the unkempt look of wild musk oxen during the shedding stage. It is believed that a healthy musk ox will yield wool for at least twenty years, with some producing more than six pounds yearly. Eskimo villagers are learning the new art of knitting this fine wool. Many Eskimo women knit a scarf sixteen inches wide and forty-eight inches long, weighing a bit less than an ounce!
So successful has been the program of domestication that a musk ox farm has been established at Old Fort Chimo in northern Quebec. Musk ox stations have been instituted in Alaska and northern Norway. Plans are afoot to set up similar arrangements in Iceland, Greenland and at Baker Lake in Canada’s Northwest Territories.
Playful and Friendly
In time the domesticated musk oxen began to show their playful tendencies. Sometimes their keepers would serve them apples, causing the animals to nuzzle their keeper’s hands with soft noses to see if one of these tasty treats was available. When dogs came around, they would instinctively take them for wolves and so would quickly form their “hedgehog” defense. Sometimes the keeper would then find himself in the center, being “protected” by his charges.
When a tractor-drawn sled was used to haul feed to them, some of the young ones would take turns jumping on the sled and riding until another animal bunted him off. In one game, a hefty animal would take possession of the top of a knoll, defying his playmates to knock him off. The one who did so would be “monarch” of the knoll until he, in turn, was dethroned!
Even children can ride this friendly denizen of the Arctic tundra; the animal has learned to trust men completely. Those having experience with these creatures speak of them as having “the winning personality of the animal kingdom” as they mischievously work at opening gates, picking locks and even men’s pockets. Sheeplike, they respond to their keeper’s voice when they are called by their own personal name! Instead of being the “world’s most dangerous game animal,” these fleece bearers have proved to be affectionate animals of the Arctic.