Volume 4, 1951 - The Arctic Circle - Home

The Varying Lemming captive in Ottaw8o By T.H. Manning
The second number of Volume III of the Arctic
Circular carried a note on four groups of Varying Lemming
brought to Ottawa from the Eastern Arctic in 1949. The
three groups of Dicrostonyx groenlandicus richardsoni from
Churchill are now extinct except for a single indiv!dual at
the National Research Council. The last of the 16 captive
D.g. groenlandicus taken at Igloolik died on 29 December
1950, a year and 106 days after capture. ln March the total
known descendants 9f the Igloolik group number 127, of which
50 are still living.
Records of this group have been kept to show the
rate of growth in young lemming and the ages at which they
develop new coats. Some preliminary experiments have also
been made on young animaIs to determine the external factors
causing the change into the white pellage. The results
so far obtained indicate that tem~er~tu~e reduction is the
main factor and that the length of exposure to light may
have little or no effect in this speciesn
So far in this group the maximum number to be born
in any one litter is 6. This has occurred only once. The
greatest number of young produced by any one pair is 43,
these being the result of 12 litters born during the period
between February 19 and November 29, 1950. The normal time
between litters is about 23 days, but in the case of the
above pair, there was one gap of 58 days.
"ExercisB Mukluk", designed to test: the latest
types of winter clothing and survival equipment of the
R.C.A.F., R.A.F. a~d U.S.A.F., took place in February.
Eighteen persons ,/'representing the three services mentioned
above, took part in the'Exercise. After spending two weeks
in bush camps in the Fort Nelson region, the group flew to
Cambridge Bay where further tests were made. The co-ordinator
of the Exercise was Flight Lt. Scott Alexander of Ottawa.
Plant life in the Arctic
InnPlant life in the Aretic", published in the
March number of the panadian Geoglaphical Journal, Mr. A.E.
Porsild describes the flora of the various types of arctic
lands cape and the ecology of thesG groups. He outlines the
factors affecting plant growth in tho Arctic and then