Bighorn Tag Lottery Nets Disease Research Dollars

Contact: Dale Toweill, Trophy Species Manager, (208) 334-2920 Bighorn sheep disease research received a shot in the arm with this yearÁ_s bighorn tag lottery. Fish and Game sheep research projects will receive $29,177, according to Ike Mortensen, president of the Idaho Chapter of the Foundation for North American Wild Sheep (FNAWS). The bighorn sheep lottery tag was approved by the Idaho Legislature in 1992. FNAWS member Herb Meyr of Mountain Home, Idaho, bought the right ticket this year. Fish and Game Director Rod Sando drew the winner July 25 in a brief ceremony attended by officers of the Idaho chapter. Idaho FNAWS members sell lottery tickets throughout the year for this annual drawing that entitles the winner to hunt a bighorn in any of this yearÁ_s open sheep hunts in Idaho. Second and third place tickets are also drawn in case a winner is disqualified or otherwise unable to use the tag. The second pick was a man from Layton, Utah while the third came from Wendell, Idaho. Idaho FNAWS sold about 4,995 tickets to raise some $38,902 this year. The chapter can retain up to 25 percent of the money to fund administrative costs such as printing tickets and promoting the lottery. Proceeds of the lottery go toward research into bighorn diseases done at the wildlife health laboratory in Caldwell. IdahoÁ_s work in wild sheep diseasesãoan effort involving Fish and Game researchers and university scientists with funding help from FNAWSãois aimed at new knowledge about problems with wildlife health that have frustrated sheep advocates for years. This pioneering research may one day be applied to bighorn populations across the west. Fish and Game Director Rod Sando and wildlife laboratory biologist Karen Rudolph, from the Idaho Wildlife Health Center, thanked the Idaho FNAWS chapter for its commitment to the bighorn program. The chapter has raised more than $270,417 since 1992 in research money raised through the annual bighorn sheep tag lottery. The other Idaho bighorn tag that FNAWS auctions at its annual convention drew $84,000 this year, one of the highest sales ever for this stateÁ_s tag. Most of that money goes toward the Hells Canyon Initiative aimed at bringing back bighorn herds in one of the largest sheep habitats left in the U.S.