There's less than a week until Christmas, and that means Santa Claus and his elves are hard at work packing up presents for the children of the world. In honor of Santa's latest upcoming worldwide trek, we've gathered up some fun facts about his preferred mode of transportation: reindeer!
Reindeer and caribou are the same animal (Rangifer tarandus)! North America refers to the continent's resident reindeer as caribou.
Instead of leaving carrots for Santa's reindeer, consider leaving them some reindeer moss! The favorite food of reindeer everywhere, reindeer moss is a type of lichen and is found in the tundra.
During the most recent ice age, reindeer could be found as far south as what is now Nevada, Tennessee, and Spain!
Rudolph could be real: some reindeer actually have red (or pink) noses! This is due to a concentration of blood vessels in the nose that help regulate the reindeers' body temperature.
A reindeer can run up to 50 miles per hour, and swim 6.2 miles per hour. Pretty impressive.
Baby reindeer are able to run soon after they are born!
Though reindeer have been domesticated for up to 3000 years (!!!) they only became associated with Santa Claus and Christmas in 1823, when Clement Clarke Moore's poem "The Night Before Christmas" was published.
The names Donner and Blitzen mean thunder and lightning in German. Rudolph was not one of Santa's reindeer until the story of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer was written by Robert May for the Montgomery Ward department stores to distribute to children.