In a large enclosure outside Soppero, north of Kiruna, the reindeer herder Simon Issát Marainen has his reindeer together with some others from the Sami village. There he lets the ropes calve.
– Here it can be in peace and we don’t have to worry, he says.
The Sami village has seen that it is profitable to calve in pens. From the calf marking in the summer until the weaning in the winter, only 20-25 percent of the calves remain if the calving takes place in the mountains. Simon Issát Marainen says this is how you keep the number of calves up.
– Here they have time to grow bigger and stronger before we release them at the beginning of June, which means they can cope better, he says.
“Shouldn’t have to be like this”
Bears and eagles are the biggest threat to the calves in the spring. If you keep them in enclosures, you are spared those problems, he says, even if the occasional calf is taken by an eagle there too. But it is not only positive feelings that he has.
– I feel compelled to work in this way. It receives. It is not in the reindeer’s nature to be enclosed. It shouldn’t have to be like this, he says.
Feeding reindeer fodder is not only unnatural but also expensive. He feels sad that traditional reindeer husbandry cannot be practiced and that his children do not get to experience that part.
– This is the short-term solution and the best I can do right now, he says.
“There is no trust in the reindeer herders”
Eagle predation is recurring every spring and the Sami Parliament is aware of the problem but does not actively work on the issue.
Rural Affairs Minister Peter Kullgren writes in an email to SVT Sápmi that he fully understands the frustration that many reindeer herders feel when their reindeer are injured by predators, such as eagles.
In the 2024 budget, the government has increased compensation for predator damage by ten million kroner, but Simon Issát expects more.
– They have no faith in the reindeer herders, even though they point it out year after year. Everything requires research for it to become a truth. That is completely wrong.