FIFTH ANNUAL REPORT. 105 
“ Owing to the law prohibiting their killing or capture, mountain sheep 
are reported to be holding their own in most of the counties named. This 
law has been in effect during the past four years, and from all reports 
which we have been able to gather there is reason to believe that there has 
been a notable increase in a number of localities. Of course, as compared 
with ten years ago, they are fewer, but there is no instance of record where 
they have disappeared entirely from localities where they were known to 
have been ten years ago.” 
Elk Mountains, Gunnison County. 1893.—Henry Gannett. 
Routt County. 1900.—Henry F. Osborn. 
Estes Park. 1900.—L. L. Dyche. 
Pagosa Springs, Archuleta County. 1898.—James W. Melrose. 
Deep Creek, near Dotsero. 1897.—L. D. Gilmore. 
Utah.—Willard, Wasatch Mountains. 1896.—D. Arrowsmith. 
Uintah Range. 1899.—William Greene. 
Little Pinto. 1899.—G. C. Goddard. 
The Big Horn, or original Rocky Mountain Sheep, justly bears 
the popular and highly appropriate title by which it has been 
known for nearly a century. In height, weight, and size of horns 
it surpasses all other American species, and is itself surpassed 
only by the Ovis ammon of the Himalayas, and its rival, the 
Ovis poli of Thibet. Ovis nivicola, of northeastern Siberia, is 
closely allied in form and size to the White Sheep of Alaska. 
For a quarter of a century the Big Horn has been constantly 
persecuted. Its flesh is very savory, although in animals under 
three years of age it so closely resembles the flesh of mule deer 
of the same age that sometimes it is impossible to detect any dif- 
ference.* In old rams, the so-called “ woolly taste”’ of mutton 
is detectable, but in young or immature animals it is scarcely so. 
The head of the male Big Horn is a trophy which appeals to 
all sorts and conditions of hunters, except Indians. In the grand- 
est head the noble red man sees nothing more than a pair of 
horn spoons for his soup-kettle. Thousands of Ovis montana 
have been hunted down and killed for their heads alone, and thou- 
sands more have met their death before the rifles of sportsmen 
because they are grand game. Their wariness, their strength and 
agility in climbing, and the rugged mountains which they inhabit 
* In Wyoming, in 1889, at the request of the writer, a test was made. Two 
plates of steaks, of deer and Mountain Sheep, were cooked in the same way and 
at the same time. In attempting to identify them by taste alone four experienced 
hunters, ambitious to be correct, all tasted and deliberately pronounced the deer 
steaks to be those of the Mountain Sheep. 
