caribou

/ˌkɛrəˈbu/

/ˈkærɪbu/

Other forms: caribous

A caribou is a large animal with four legs, hooves, and big antlers. In Europe and Asia, a caribou is known as a reindeer.

In North America, caribou live in parts of Canada and Alaska, in both tundra and boreal forests. Many caribou migrate long distances, and all of them are herbivores, living to a great degree on a specific type of lichen. The word caribou is originally French Canadian, from the Micmac word kaleboo, "the one who paws," for the way caribou scratch the snow aside to find moss in the winter.

Definitions of caribou

1. noun

   Arctic deer with large antlers in both sexes; called 'reindeer' in Eurasia and 'caribou' in North America
   synonyms: Greenland caribou, Rangifer tarandus, reindeer

   types:

   Rangifer caribou, woodland caribou

   any of several large caribou living in coniferous forests of southern Canada; in some classifications included in the species Rangifer tarandus

   Rangifer arcticus, barren ground caribou

   of tundra of northern Canada; in some classifications included in the species Rangifer tarandus

   type of:

   cervid, deer

   distinguished from Bovidae by the male's having solid deciduous antlers