a musk oxen moves slowly on the snow. explain
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Answer:
Average Weight: 180 to 410kg (400 - 900 lbs)
Average Height: 1.1 - 1.5m (4-5 feet) tall at the shoulder, appear to be larger than they are due to the thick, long coat and large head. They are smaller than bison which they resemble, bison can be twice the weight of a musk ox.
Breeding: Musk oxen are harem breeders in which males compete for dominance with the winner breeding with all females in oestrus. Females usually give birth to a single calf every year or every two or even three years if feeding conditions have not been favourable. The young are born after an 8 month pregnancy, twins are uncommon and rarely survive. The young are very well developed at birth being up and feeding within around 45 minutes. They are able to follow their mother back to the herd a few hours later.
Estimated world population: 150,000 worldwide, of which about 75% are in Canada.
Feeding & diet: Generalized herbivores eating whatever plant material they can readily find. In the summer months, this is by preference soft nutritious grasses and other wild plants. Their faeces are moist and still high in nutrients at this time indicating that food is abundant enough that they don't need to try too hard to absorb all of the nutrition from it. Instead they can take the easy to get at nutrients and then go for more food rather than retaining food in the digestive system for a long time to fully digest it.
In the winter months, they turn to roots, dwarf willow and dwarf birch, lichens, mosses and other vegetation they can access beneath the snow. At this time the faecal matter is dry and has little nutritional value suggesting a slower process through the digestive system that leads to a more thorough removal of nutrients itself a result of less plentiful and less nutritious food.
Conservation status - Least Concern.
Distribution: Arctic North America to Greenland, native to the far north found in treeless tundra. They were introduced to other areas around the Arctic during the 20th century where they had previously died out or been hunted to extinction.
Predators: Arctic wolves are the main predator and may account for up to 50% of all mortality, grizzly bears and polar bears are occasional predators, mainly of calves and infirm adults.