REINDEER FOR HIRE!

appearances this season at holiday parties for Zynga and YouTube and are on view daily at the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco.

Like many reindeer ranchers, Frieling, 68, got into the business as a way to subsidise other projects. Her main vocation is Windswept Ranch, a farm in Tehachapi, California, where she shelters some 40 rescued animals, including donkeys, deer, zebras, goats, bison, pigs and a yak.

“We started off with dogs and kittens, and it just kind of progressed,” she said of her eclectic menagerie. About 20 years ago, seeking a way to earn enough money to keep the ranch operating, she hit on the idea of raising and renting out reindeer. The revenue they bring in during the holidays covers most of the farm’s annual costs.

Reindeer loom large in the cultural imagination, but people are often slightly shocked to encounter a live one, owners say.

“I have a lot of adults pull me aside and whisper, ‘What are they really?’” said Mark Sopko, 46, the owner of Reindeer Magic and Miracles in Branchburg, New Jersey.

They are really reindeer. Native to chilly places like the Arctic and parts of northern Europe, reindeer, close relatives of caribou, were imported to Alaska in the 1890s, and are now raised in domesticated herds in dozens of states. An industry trade group, the Reindeer Owners and Breeders Association, has about 140 members, nearly all of them small and independent.

“It’s not a business; it’s a love thing,” said Mike Jablonski, the group’s president, who has 50 reindeer on his farm in Hamburg, New York. “No one is going to become a millionaire off reindeer. They’re very hard to raise.”

Heartbreak is an inevitable part of the business. After a lifelong fascination with reindeer, Sopko, a veterinary dental technician, bought his first pair in 2012. Sopko calls the night they arrived — right before Christmas, naturally — the most magical day of his life. Rocket earned his name by tearing around his home field, while Fetch loved to carry around sticks to chase and chew.

Sopko booked holiday events to offset the cost of keeping them, but this autumn, both reindeer succumbed to a tick-borne disease. Devastated by their deaths, Sopko considered giving up on his tiny reindeer farm, but in the end, the allure of the creatures won out. He is starting over with two new reindeer, including a 6-month-old calf, who likes to kick soccer balls.

“He’s like a puppy with antlers,” Sopko said.

Getting into the reindeer business gen-