Five reasons why the reindeer is the ideal animal to pull Santa’s sleigh

We all know that Father Christmas would struggle to deliver presents to everyone around the world without the help of his magical reindeer. But why were they chosen to pull the sleigh rather than any other animal?

It turns out that the biology of reindeer makes them ideal for the job. Here are five reasons why.

1. Warmth

Reindeer live in the Arctic, where temperatures on long winter nights often plummet below -30 degrees Celsius. Unlike most mammals, which only have one layer of fur, reindeer have two: a dense underfur beneath a blanket of hollow guard hairs. Reindeer can have up to 2,000 hairs packed into a single square centimetre, making it ten times as dense as human hair.

This double layer traps air and creates a cover of insulation that keeps reindeer from losing heat, and stops snow from reaching and cooling the skin. This enables reindeer to keep warm, whether living with Santa at the North Pole or travelling around the world on Christmas Eve.

In addition, when blood reaches our extremities, like our fingers and toes, it cools and our hearts must pump at a faster rate to warm the blood up again. This requires a lot of energy which we get from food, something that is…

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