Owyhee River California bighorn sheep herd carrying capacity study, January 1996–December 1996

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This report presents results of the 1996 study (segment of a multiyear study) conducted in portions of the Deep Creek, East Fork Owyhee River, and South Fork Owyhee River areas of southwest Owyhee County for carrying capacity for bighorn sheep. Researchers estimated sheep abundance and distribution, identified seasonal and yearly diet, documented vegetation types, analyzed plant productivity and nutritional availability, and identified bighorn sheep nutritional requirements. Researchers erected exclosure cages along Deep Creek, collected data from vegetation samples inside and outside the exclosures, classified canyon bottom/riparian vegetation communities, collected bighorn sheep fecal samples, submitted those samples for laboratory analysis. The population of the Owyhee River herd increased slightly (16%) in 1996 compared with the drastically reduced population of 1994, but population numbers are well below those estimated in the early 1990s. Fecal samples indicated that wheatgrass (Agropyron sp) made up 68% of the diet and prickly phlox (Leptodactalon spp) made up 12%. Of the four distinctive riparian communities identified, sheep foraging activity was recorded in three of them. Further sampling is needed to better understand seasonal herbivore use relative to bighorn sheep use, as well as carrying capacity of the area.

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ELECTRONIC FILE - Zoology

Note: No data is provided. Page 9 is missing.

Note: I had all the "preparers" here as authors (though they were listed in alphabetical order near the end of the document), along with U. S. Air Force, Air Combat Command, as a primary author. But I took out the individuals' names when I saw similar people called "project personnel" in a similar document. Also, in one of those documents I noticed that one name/person listed for this document is a graphic artist, so should have been a secondary author in my first scheme of listing individuals. Since the publisher didn't treat the individuals as authors, I won't here. --pjp