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28-678: The previous sledge patrol headquarters, Eskimonaes (Eskimonæs) , 27 km southwest of later Daneborg at Dødemandsbugten on the south coast of Clavering Ø , which had also been the location of the last Inuit settlement in Northeast Greenland (1823), was destroyed by German World War II invaders on March 23, 1943. The story of the wartime efforts of the North-East Greenland Sledge Patrol under Ib Poulson were chronicled postwar by English author David Armine Howarth in his 1951 book The Sledge Patrol . The station at

56-514: A seal, the custom of sprinkling water over a seal or walrus before skinning, and their amazement at the demonstration of firearms for hunting. European visitors to Northeast Greenland prior to 1823 reported evidence of extensive Inuit settlement in the region although they encountered no humans. Later expeditions, starting with the Second German North Polar Expedition in 1869, found the remains of many former settlements, but

84-560: A small nose, fat that makes up close to 20% of its body, and a thick coat of fur . It usually digs holes in the ground or under the snow to keep warm and to sleep. Arctic hares look like rabbits but have shorter ears, are taller when standing, and, unlike rabbits, can thrive in extreme cold. They can travel together with many other hares, sometimes huddling with dozens or more, but are usually found alone, sometimes taking more than one partner. The Arctic hare can run up to 60 kilometres per hour (40 mph). Arctic explorer John Ross described

112-527: A small peninsula in the south coast of Clavering Island. The place had been named Eskimonæsset by the 1929-30 Expedition to East Greenland led by Lauge Koch , after the abandoned Inuit settlement of four houses, of which two were excavated at the time. The station was built as a scientific post and was also used later as a base by the Three-year Expedition to East Greenland , as well as by other scientists from 1931 to 1939. From 1941 to 1943, it became

140-477: A variety of other foods, including lichens and mosses , blooms, other species' leaves, twigs, and roots, mountain sorrel and macroalgae (seaweed). Arctic hare diets are more diverse in summer. Although previously believed to still be primarily willow, dryas , and grasses , recent studies show that their diet becomes dominated by legumes, constituting 70% of their diet in the summer. Arctic hares have been reported to occasionally eat meat, including fish and

168-430: Is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Eskimonaes Clavering Island ( Danish : Clavering Ø ) is a large island in eastern Greenland off Gael Hamke Bay , to the south of Wollaston Foreland . The Eskimonaes (Eskimonæs) radio and weather station was on this island. It was staffed by Danish scientists and was captured by German troops in 1943. The place where the station stood had also been

196-608: Is distributed over the northernmost regions of Greenland , the Canadian Arctic islands and Northern Canada , including Ellesmere Island , and farther south in Labrador and Newfoundland . The Arctic hare is well adapted to conditions found in the tundras , plateaus , and treeless coasts of this region, including cold weather and frozen precipitation . The Arctic hare may be found at elevations from sea level to 900 m (3,000 ft). In Newfoundland and Southern Labrador ,

224-536: Is often significantly less in the winter compared to the summer, likely caused by decreased food quality and availability in addition to a decreased metabolic rate. Arctic hare body mass might also be affected by ambient temperature. At lower latitudes it was found that Arctic hares in Greenland exhibited larger body size with increased temperature, possibly caused by increased energy availability to contribute to body size and increased food plant availability. The opposite

252-494: Is probably the most successful predator of the Arctic hare, and even young wolves in their first autumn can catch adult hares. Arctic foxes and ermines, which are smaller, typically prey on young hares. Gyrfalcon carry hares to their nests, cutting them in half first; gyrfalcons use hare bones and feet in the structure of their nests on Ellesmere Island , Nunavut . Peregrine falcons ( Falco peregrinus ) also prey on Arctic hares in

280-400: Is true at higher latitudes in which Arctic hares had smaller body sizes with increased temperature. This trend is again linked to food plant availability. In this case, decreased precipitation and increased temperatures in the higher latitudes of Greenland result in a lower food plant availability to contribute to body mass. Breeding season occurs around April or May. Gestation period of

308-698: The Holocene epoch, with fossils from the Last Glacial Period found in North America and Europe and no fossils from before the Holocene found in Russia. The Arctic hare is a herbivore , specifically a folivore . Arctic hares feed primarily on woody plants , with arctic willow constituting 95% of their diet year-round. Arctic hares predominantly consume saxifrage , crowberry , and dwarf willow , but can also eat

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336-429: The Arctic hare changes its coat color , moulting and growing new fur, from brown or grey in the summer to white in the winter. This seasonal moulting also enables other Arctic animals, including ermine and ptarmigan , to remain camouflaged as the environment changes. However, the Arctic hares in the far north of Canada , where summer is very short, remain white all year round. Arctic hare fossils are rare prior to

364-446: The Arctic hare in 1819. The Arctic hare is one of the largest living lagomorphs . Typically, this species measures from 43 to 70 cm (17 to 28 in) long, not counting a tail length of 4.5 to 10 cm (1.8 to 3.9 in). The body mass of this species is typically between 2.5–5.5 kg (6–12 lb), though large individuals can weigh up to 7 kg (15 lb). There are four subspecies of this hare: The Arctic hare

392-408: The Arctic hare is 53 days, so the babies are born around May, June, or July. Hares can have up to eight babies (average litter size 5.4), called leverets. The leverets stay within the mother's home range until they can survive on their own. Young Arctic hares are almost full size by late July (some weeks after birth) and breed for the first time after a year of age. There is little information on

420-447: The Arctic hare to save energy, making it adaptive for its cold and barren habitat. In addition, the Arctic hare has high locomotive efficiency combined with long periods of resting and shorter bouts of foraging which enables it to conserve energy and survive on its low diet intake. The white fur of Arctic hares, in addition to their camouflage benefits in the winter, have a high reflectance which may prevent excessive heat gain during

448-617: The day. Behaviorally, the Arctic hare keeps warm in winter using body orientation, posture, and seeking or digging shelter. When resting, Arctic hares maintain a nearly spherical shape and typically stay in groups, but do not huddle. If the rabbits are solitary, they often rest in the shelter of large rocks protecting them from the wind and staying out of sight of predators. In addition to rocks, Arctic hares also find shelter in other natural shelters such as snowdrifts, man-made structures, and even digging their own burrows in snowdrifts up to 188 cm in length. The body size of Arctic hares

476-666: The headquarters of the Danish North-East Greenland Sledge Patrol . During the war, the code name used for the Eskimonæs Station by the US Coast Guard was ' Bluie East Five ' — the same code name would be later used for Myggbukta after Eskimonæs was destroyed. The main building at Eskimonaes was burnt by a German military patrol on 25 March 1943, and the site was bombed by the US Air Force on 14 May

504-594: The lifespan of Arctic hares. Some anecdotal evidence suggests they live three to five years in the wild. Arctic hares do not fare well in captivity, living only a year and a half at most. Known predators of the Arctic hare are the Arctic fox ( Vulpes lagopus ), Red fox ( Vulpes vulpes ), Wolf ( Canis lupus ), Lynx ( Lynx canadensis ), Ermine ( Mustela erminea ), Snowy owl ( Bubo scandiacus ), Gyrfalcon ( Falco rusticolus ), Rough-legged hawk ( Buteo lagopus ) – and occasionally humans. The Arctic wolf

532-456: The location of the last Inuit settlement in Northeast Greenland around 1823. The island was named by the second German North Polar Expedition 1869–70 as Clavering Insel to commemorate Douglas Charles Clavering (1794–1827), commander of the Griper on the 1823 voyage, which explored the area and, at the southern shore of this island made the first (and last) encounter that Europeans made with

560-543: The now extinct Northeast-Greenland Inuit . In late August 1823, Clavering and the crew of the Griper encountered a band of twelve Inuit, including men, women and children. In his journal, Clavering described their seal-skin tent, canoe, and clothes, their harpoons and spear tipped with bone and meteoric iron , and their physical appearance ("tawny coppery" skin, "black hair and round visages; their hands and feet very fleshy, and much swelled"). He remarked on their skill in skinning

588-594: The population had apparently died out during the intervening years. Bones of muskoxen have been found at Inuit sites on the island, but no such animals were reported by Clavering in 1823. Large numbers of Arctic hare bones suggest that the Inuit were reduced to hunting smaller game after the extinction of muskoxen in the area. After humans died out, muskoxen returned, and the first pair of live muskoxen ever to be brought to Europe were captured at Clavering Island in 1899. The Eskimonaes radio and telegraph station stood on

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616-617: The same year. The burnt out station would be replaced by Dødemandsbugten Station, also known as Ny Station, which was built nearby further to the east later in the same year. Dødemandsbugten would be succeeded in 1944 by Daneborg and the ruins of the two former stations lay now abandoned and remain essentially undisturbed as a conspicuous memorial to war-time events. The efforts of the North-East Greenland Sledge Patrol led by Ib Poulson in World War II were chronicled after

644-598: The site of the current Daneborg was originally established in summer 1944, during World War II, under the command of Captain Strong of US Coast Guard Cutter Storis near the trapping station Sandodden , as an American military weather station, and staffed with six men of the 8th Weather Squadron Detachment. At the end of the war, the station was taken over by the North East Greenland Sledge Patrol as their new regional headquarters and named Daneborg. Part of

672-539: The southwest part of Clavering Island that was named by Lauge Koch during his 1929–30 expedition. Some small islands are located nearby, such as the Finsch Islands to the south and Jackson Island far to the southeast at the mouth of the bay. Arctic hare 4, see text The Arctic hare ( Lepus arcticus ) is a species of hare highly adapted to living in the Arctic tundra and other icy biomes. The Arctic hare survives with shortened ears and limbs,

700-450: The southwest, and Gael Hamke Bay in the southeast. Payer Land lies to the west, A. P. Olsen Land to the north, Wollaston Foreland to the east and northeast. The island's highest point is the 1650 m high Ortlerspids and the island has an area of 1,534.6 km (592.5 sq mi) and a shoreline of 165.4 km (102.8 mi). The Halle Range (Hallebjergene) is an up to 1,200-metre-high (3,900 ft) mountain chain on

728-507: The station was built by material left behind at the German wartime station Lille Koldeway further north, which had been established by Operation Edelweiss II . Daneborg has a polar climate ( Köppen ET ). With very low annual rain or snowfall it has strong desert influences. 74°18′07.6″N 20°13′27.1″W  /  74.302111°N 20.224194°W  / 74.302111; -20.224194 This military base or fortification article

756-450: The stomach contents of eviscerated caribou . They eat snow to get water. The Arctic hare has many physiological features that are adaptive to its extreme environment. Despite a 17% - 38% lower than expected basal metabolic rate , the Arctic hare is able to maintain a body temperature comparable to other lagomorphs (38.9 degrees C) because of its low surface area to volume ratio and high insulation. The lowered metabolic rate also allows

784-622: The war by English author David Armine Howarth in his 1951 book The Sledge Patrol . Clavering Island is a coastal island, separated from the mainland by fjords and sounds of the Greenland Sea , some of which are narrow. The Tyrolerfjord bounds the island in the north, with its extension, the Young Sound in the northeast, Rudi Bay and the Copeland Fjord in the west, the Godthab Gulf in

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