218 University of California Publications in Zoology [Vol. 12 



GENERAL ACCOUNTS OF THE MAMMALS : LOCAL 

 DISTRIBUTION, VARIATION. HABITS 



Ovis canadensis nelsoni Merriam 

 Desert Bighorn 



Mountain sheep still occur in parts of the country on both sides 

 of the river. Among The Needles, on the Arizona side, March 5, fresh 

 feces and footprints showed plainly where a band of at least five had 

 been grazing. The point of this occurrence was not more than half 

 a mile from the river and 300 feet in elevation above it. 



We were assured of the existence of a flock of fully thirty-five 

 sheep on the Arizona side east of Cibola. These sheep were reported 

 to visit regularly certain springs in the Chocolate Mountains. 



On the California side, as we were informed, sheep used to range 

 over Riverside Mountain, but they have not been seen there of late 

 years, probably because of the mining activity in that vicinity. Pros- 

 pectors told us that they had always taken every opportunity to 

 obtain "fresh meat" wherever they might be in the desert hills; 

 and as the camps of the prospectors are usually made at the water 

 holes which the sheep depend upon in the long, dry seasons, it is not 

 difficult to account for the disappearance of sheep in a mineralized 

 region ! 



West of the river, 16 to 22 miles above Picacho. we found sheep 

 to be quite common. At least five had been killed within the previous 

 year by residents along the river. Two of these were shot from a 

 rancher's house and within a few hundred yards of the river, which 

 here flows between steep hills, with relatively little bottomland inter- 

 vening. This, by the way, is in the near vicinity of Lighthouse Rock, 

 and in the sketch of the river including this landmark, given in Ives' 

 Report upon the Colorado Fiver of the West (1861, page 52, figure 7), 

 two unmistakable bighorns are portrayed at the water's edge. 



We learned nothing to indicate that the sheep in this neighborhood 

 ever visit the river for water at the present time. There are springs 

 back in the hills to which the sheep regularly resort. We saw five 

 sheep, and secured two, a ewe (no. 10588) and a male lamb (no. 

 10589). These were found about three miles west of the river among 

 rough hills. 



