Spilyqy Ty woo, Wqrro Springs, Oregon
December 9, 2004
Bighorns: Helicopter flies
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Spllyay photo Brian Mortensen
Members of the ground crew at Eagle Creek Canyon watch
as a helicopter piloted by Jim Pope Jr., of Clarkston, Wash.,
flies in a group of five sheep from the Lower John Day area
Saturday afternoon.
(Continued from page 1)
"But we're going to try to ex
pand their range a little bit, so
they'll mix with those other
sheep."
The sheep populations have
proven resilient where they
have been introduced, and if
especially lush forage is avail
able, they flourish, as the herds
in the John Day and Deschutes
river canyons have, Klus said.
"With the Warm Springs
sheep, they'll go right into that
release we put in a couple years
ago, so it's kind of a supplement
more than new release, so 15 is
a good number since they're go
ing to have sheep nearby that
they're probably going to mix in
with," Klus said. "That's just
going to give that group a little
bit of a boost and help them
expand a little more quickly."
By themselves, the group of
20 sheep introduced to the
Mutton Mountains in 2002 has
increised by 50 percent, even
with some predation and a pos
sible case of poaching since
then.
The sheep were captured by
helicopter, just as they were in
2002. Flying a powerful Hughes
500 aircraft was pilot Jim Pope
Jr., of Leading Edge Aviation of
Clarkston, Wash. On board to
capture the sheep and keep
them secure in their flight to
both a base camp near Condon
and then in their flight onto res
ervation land was a capture
crew from Greybull, Wyo. The
work in capturing wildlife is
"high-risk, financially and physi
cally," Klus said.
The animals are captured
when a crewmember shoots a
net out of a gun while the heli
copter pursues them. After the
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animals are netted, the helicop
ter lands, and other
crewmembers secure the ani
mals, hobbling their feet and
blindfolding them.
They are transported to a
base camp, where veterinarians
examine them for siens of
shock injury, mainly, and other
ailments they might find.
"Normally, we have a proto
col where we give them some
penicillin, a long-lasting (dose) of
penicillin that gives them a
couple extra days of antibiotic
coverage for bacteria that might
take advantage of a stressed
animal," said Dr. Leon Pielstick,
a veterinarian from Hines who
has worked on such sheep
round-ups for 15 years.
In addition, the sheep are
given medicine to fight
clostridial infection, better
known among people who work
stock as black leg disease, and a
vaccination of vitamin E and
selenium.
"That's very specific to help
with muscle damage associated
with capture stress, a condition
known as capture myopathy," he
said. "And you also give them a
de-worming agentD
Ringworm's a real problem, plus
some other parasites, so we
want to turn out clean animals."
A blood test of each animal
is also conducted to help deter
mine and fight diseases in the
future. A new measure includes
clipping the tip of the sheep's
horn to record its DNA.
Overall, each of the sheep is
in "really good shape,"
healthwise, Pielstick said. Sheep
from the John Day River can
yon tend to be less stressed than
the sheep that come from the
Deschutes River area
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'Tor Deschutes River sheep,
which we rounded up earlier in
the year, it's always tough," he
said. "It seems like it's tougher
country, you alwjys have to
chase them a little harder, you
have more issues with rolling
down the hill as they're captured.
Traditionally, sheep that come
off the Deschutes tend to be a
little more stressed."
Sheep are rounded up dur
ing the coldest times of the year
because the cool weather re
duces the threat of stress, when
body temperatures are already
overheating and heart rates rise
above normal..
The base camp for last week's
round-up was in a field south
west of Condon, where around
30 people, including tribal mem
bers, representatives of the Con
federated Tribes, ODFW, Bu
reau of Land Management, in
terested local residents, and
members of the Foundation for
North American Wild Sheep
(FNAWS) were gathered.
As soon as the quota of 15
destined for Eagle Creek was
reached around mid-morning
Saturday, the sheep were driven
to a point on U.S. 97 near Crite
rion Summit, about eight miles
south of Maupin.
Range and Agriculture Man
ager Jason Smith transported the
sheep on moitly straight roads
to minimize movement that
ni'giit cxaceioaie stress
northwest to Wasco and
. . .
might exacerbate stress levels,
south
on U.S. 97 to Criterion Summit.
The staging area was wide
enough for the helicopter to land
and take off and for the sheep
to be unloaded from the trailer,
hobbled and loaded individually
into denim and canvas bags for
their transport into Eagle Creek
canyon, 6.1 air miles west.
In groups of five, the sheep
then took their second helicop
ter ride of the day and arrived
at their new home. At Eagle
Creek, a group of 10 people
waited for the three loads of
sheep. The group, including
seven tribal members, was
briefed on how to handle the
animals once they arrived.
"The sheep are going to be
coming in, they'll be in bags and
hanging, kind of like daisy
chained down off pf a cable,"
Luther instructed the group.
"(After the bagged sheep are
undipped from the helicopter
cable), two people teams will
take a sheep and move it off to
one side until we have five sheep
all lined up."
The sheep were moved into
a side-by-side line, where the
bags were pulled off them, their
blindfolds loosened, but not yet
removed, and their hobbles re
moved. "These animals are going to
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sheep into roadless
be pretty stressed out," Luther
warned. "They're going to be
hot. They'll be panting and prob
ably quivering, and what you
don't want to do is if they start
to struggle is kneel on their
chest. They're pretty strong ani
mals and they may try to
scramble and get up."
Two-man teams were as
signed for each sheep. While
they stabilized the animal and
avoided the sheeps' horns or
hooves, Dr. Pielstick examined
each one, checking their breath
ing and movements and even
the color of their gums for signs
of stress or injury.
All this was done with utmost
efficiency and as silently as pos
sible to keep the sheep calm.
And when Pielstick gave the
silent "go" sign, the blindfolds
were removed from each sheep
and they were let go, like the start
of a race, and the sheep ran
away, preferably in a southerly
direction so they could encoun
ter the most habitable spot for
them.
"They're going to try to go
up on steeper ground, but who
knows," Luther told the group.
"There's no control after you let
them go, but they'll all find each
other."
Fourteen of the 15 sheep
swiftly galloped away, usually in
groups. One didn't, however,
"...We'll just keep real close track of them
for the next couple Months. "
Warm Springs Fish and Wildlife manager
Terry Luther
not immediately.
This was a ewe, the one that
had been captured Friday. She
spent Friday night alone in the
horse trailer. The ewe appeared
calm Saturday morning, stand
ing in a docile fashion in the
middle of the trailer, perhaps
wondering of its destiny, per
haps wishing for company from
her fellow sheep.
But when Pielstick deemed
the sheep ready and cleared for
their release into the hills, it
didn't run away as the others
had. It stayed put on the ground
near the men who loosed it from
its temporary bindings.
Pielstick shaved some hair
from its throat with a battery
powered razor and instructed
Joel Santos, part of the "ground
crew" to hold and squeeze a bag
of intravenous fluid into a
needle placed under the skin in
the ewe's neck.
"I was looking at the gums,
they weren't nice and bright and
pink like they should be," the
veterinarian said. "They were
kind of a pale, bluish color, so
I assessed that she was a little
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Dr. Leon Pielstick, Burns, left, helps Larry Holliday and Don
Winishut loosen the binds from a California mountain sheep
after it was flown in from Criterion Peak Saturday afternoon. .
shocky."
So he injected a fluid to
counteract the shock and stress
that had taken her over, and he
injected a dextrose solution to
give her an energy supply against
the hypoglycemic shock he as
sessed. "What happens on release is
that the stress of capture can
cause muscle damage, and
we've done everything at base
camp, and we've usually caught
them to prevent that, but it's just
part of the game," he said.
Pielstick said that though the
sheep may have appeared calm
as she stood in the trailer, what
she endured was "very, fright
ening", , 1 ; , , ;
"Unfortunately, you don't
like to leave one animal by it
self in the trailer if at all pos
sible," he said. "They ran out of
daylight (Friday), and they tried
to get more but they couldn't,
so she spent the night by her
self. "She looked good today, and
she got friends. She looked good
in the trailer, but the second
flight just burned up her energy
reserves, so we gave her a little
shot of energy, and so hope
fully, it'll come together."
In fact, not even a minute
after the dextrose was injected,
the ewe stood up and ran away,
albeit in a slower pace, but she
found her freedom.
Each of the groups of sheep
arrived at Eagle Canyon about
20 minutes apart, an interval
allowing enough time for the
team of handlers to regroup
and get ready for the next batch.
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The mood of the group,
made up of experienced hunt
ers and outdoorsmen was enthu
siastic yet laid back.
To a man, they said they en
joyed working with the sheep.
"Actually, I thought they
would be bigger," said Lyman
Jim, a technician for the Tribe's
Fish and Wildlife Department.
Saturday's method of bring
ing the sheep onto the reserva
tion was different from when it
was done in 2002 at Antoken
Creek, as the sheep were sim
ply released from the back of a
trailer. The release point Satur
day was in a roadless area, re-
quiring a hike of about a mile,
Saturday's release was the
third mountain sheep round-up
Warm Springs Fish and Wildlife
management crews have been
involved in. Luther, Doug
Calvin and Stan Simtustus had
participated in one in 2001. ,
To monitor the sheep, the
Tribes has a pilot from Madras
on contract who has a two-seat
airplane to help observe the
sheep herds.
"We'll fly particularly for
these (sheep), we'll be flying early
this next week, and monitor
them really closely," Luther said.
"We'll probably fly every week
for about a month or a month
and a half, and we'll see where
they settle. And depending on
where they're at, we'll walk in
and do some observing and we'll
just keep real close track of
them for the next couple
months.
"By then, they usually settle
into an area, and then they're
more predictable, and then we'll
monitor them every couple of
weeks." ,
Luther said that unless some
thing catastrophic happened to
the sheep herd, there may be no
more need to move sheep
intothe reservation.
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