BIGHORN SHEEP Essay, Research Paper

The bighorn or the bighorn sheep, ovis candensis, is the family bovidae in the order Artiodactyla. It is a wild sheep with a silky coat similar to that of a deer, varying from brown to buff. The male bighorn, or ram, may be as much as 150 cm long, about 100 cm at the shoulders, and weigh 157kg; females are the smaller. The muzzle is narrow. Despite it’s bulk, the bighorn can negotiate mountainous terrain, aided by it’s sharp cloven hooves with elastic pads. The ram carries a majestic set of curving horns about 45 cm in cercumfrence and up to 120 cm long; the females horns are smaller. The largest bighorns are the rocky mountain bighorn and the California bighorns from canada. Bighorns are characterized by their short ears and large horns. They eat grasses, flwers, young plants and even cacti.

The bighorn was once numerous from the mountains of southern canada to Northern Mexico; disease, food scarcity, and overhunting, however have reduced the population. Today, They are found only in remote mountain areas and national parks in the united states.

In many places they have a lottery for ram tags. A lottery is where you send in a application for a ram and they pick a bunch of names and those people get tags. Last year in North Dakota they had only one ram tag given out and they had to bid on it and it was sold for $35,000. The reason it cost so much is because there are so few rams in North Dakota and also because there are very few rams in North Dakota.

The prices can vary from $2,500 for a 7 day hunt to $13,500 for a 16 to 20 day hunt.

Good rams score about 170 boone and Crockett points and in order for the ram to be legal the ram has to have at least 4/5 of a curl.

Andy Petras