Page:The Scientific Monthly vol. 3.djvu/411

 CONSERVATION OF THE NATIVE FAUNA 405

On the slopes and shonlders of Mount Shasta the Ovia moniatM exists in large numbers; so much so that one spur of the mountain has been named "Sheep Bock" and there hunters are always sure of finding them.

The bighorn was referred to also as being habitually present in the vicinity of Bhett and Wright Lakes^ eastward from Mount Shasta. The Modoc Expedition from the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, 1910, found evidence of their former presence in the Warner Moimtains of extreme northeastern California. Stephens^' asserts that bighorns were " . . . formerly found in parts of the Sierra Nevada and on Mount Shasta^ but they are apparently now exterminated in those mountains.^'

In October, 1911, in a section of the Sierra Nevada which is a portion of one of the wildest and most scenic regions in the world, there were secured the specimens on which the description of the form was based. It is asserted by Ober,^^ deputy fish and game commissioner for the district, that there are three bands of the Sierran bighorn ranging over a comparatively restricted tract of jagged and precipitous country on the face of the Sierran fault block. GrinnelP^ has set the northern and southern limits of range of the species as being respectively Mono County and Mount Whitney. A recent definite record of bighorns on the west slope of the Sierras is for the north spur of Mount Silliman, altitude 10,600 feet, within the Sequoia National Park, where sheep were seen August 19, 1910.*' It is quite likely that the former range of the species included Mount Shasta and the Modoc region.

The Nelson bighorn, a smaller, shorter-haired species than its Sier- ran relative, is typical of the desert ranges of southeastern California, from the Inyo region south at least to the Mexican line." Formerly it is said to have occurred northwest through the Tejon region to the Caliente Hills, San Luis Obispo County, and there are reports of its persistence still in scattered localities in this general district. At pres- ent the desert sheep is apparently increasing in some sections of its range, notably the desert ranges in Inyo County,'^ and stationary or decreasing in others, as in the desert portions of the more southerly counties, San Bernardino, Eiverside and Imperial.*' There are, fortu- nately, some large bands which promise well, and which at least indicate that there is no cause for concern over the immediate future of the species within the state.

19 '< California Mammahi," 1900, p. 58. ti Proe. Calif. Acad, Sci., 4th Ser., 3^ 1913, p. 369.
 * o 23d Bien. Bpt., Calif. Fiah and Game Com., 1914, p. 125.

M [Fry], ''Sequoia and Gen. Grant Nat Parks," Gen. Inf., Dept. Int., 1915, p. 22.

SB Grinnielly Proc, Calif. Acad. 8ci., 4th Ser., 3, 1913, p. 369.

s« Oher, 23d Bien. Bpt., Calif. Fish and Game Com., 1914, pp. 123-124.

28 See Stephens, same, pp. 128-130.

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