CHAPTER XVIII 



MOUNTAIN SHEEP NOTES 



The Culminating Point of a Species — Measurements of Record Heads 

 — Range of the Big-Horn — The White Sheep — The Black Sheep — 

 Fannin's Sheep — Fighting Noses of our Specimens — Reinforce- 

 ment of the Neck — Captain RadcHfFe's Opinion About Broken Tips 

 — Measurements of our Sheep — Comparative Dimensions of Sheep, 

 Goat and Mule Deer — Comparison of Sheep and Goat — Enemies 

 of Mountain Sheep — Impending Extinction in British Columbia. 



Mr. Phillips's mountain sheep rams were to all of 

 us specimens of great interest. All three were carefully 

 measured and weighed, and the skins of all were saved 

 entire, for mounting. The oldest and largest ram, and 

 the five-year-old, were presented by Mr. Phillips to the 

 Carnegie Museum at Pittsburg, and the second in size 

 was given to me, for presentation to the Brooklyn Insti- 

 tute Museum. 



American literature is not so much overburdened 

 with information regarding the mountain sheep of North 

 America that I need apologize for noting here a few of 

 the most important facts regarding that group of animals. 

 Be it known, therefore, that it is in the very locality in 

 which we then found ourselves — southeastern British 

 Columbia, — that the true Rocky Mountain Big-Horn, 

 (now Ovis canadensis, but for eighty years called Ovis 



montana) , reaches its maximum development. 



250 



