Bighorn Tag Lottery Nets Disease Research Dollars

Contact: Dale Toweill, Trophy Species Manager, (208) 334-2920 A major source of funding for bighorn sheep health research in Idaho received another boost with this year's bighorn tag lottery. About $60,000 was raised this year in the lottery. The bighorn sheep lottery tag was approved by the Idaho Legislature in 1992. The first ticket drawn belonged to Bill Burrows, a Nevada resident. Two alternates were drawn in case the winner cannot use the bighorn tag. Both alternates came from outside Idaho. Winning tickets were drawn July 30 by Fish and Game Director Steve Huffaker. Foundation for North American Wild Sheep (FNAWS) president Ray Lee read the tickets for the attending crowd. Officers and members of the Idaho Chapter of FNAWS, as well as Fish and Game staff including researchers from the wildlife laboratory at Caldwell, attended the drawing. Huffaker called the lottery part of a "great program" aimed at "taking care of the habitat and putting sheep on the mountain." FNAWS president Lee said the lottery is a "fantastic opportunity" for "anybody with $10 for a ticket." 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 year's open sheep hunts in Idaho. The chapter can retain up to 25 percent of the money to fund administrative costs such as printing tickets and promoting the lottery. Sales of tickets for next July's drawing will begin in January. Proceeds of the lottery go toward research into bighorn diseases done at the wildlife health laboratory in Caldwell. Idaho's work in wild sheep diseases--an effort involving Fish and Game researchers and university scientists with funding help from FNAWS--is 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. The Idaho FNAWS Chapter has raised more than $330,000 since 1992 in research money through the annual bighorn sheep tag lottery. Another Idaho bighorn tag is auctioned by FNAWS at its annual convention. 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.