By Brad Devereaux

Big Horn sheep are well adapted with strong legs and hooves that allow them to scamper across the rocky cliffs and narrow shelves within the Big Horn Canyon area that they call home.

For humans, to track and capture the sheep in this rugged terrain takes a different skill set.

Two helicopters, each carrying a pilot and crew, arrived at Cottonwood Canyon Friday morning. They greeted a crowd of 30-plus people including Game and Fish officials, students, reporters and other observers with an overhead fly-by before bobbing through the canyon to scour the sagebrush dotted topography for Big Horn sheep.

The Game and Fish carried out the capture as part of a transplant operation to re-locate a dozen sheep from south of Devil’s Canyon to the Seminoe Mountains near Rawlins.

The purpose of the action was two fold, according to Big Horn Sheep Coordinator Kevin Hurley: to bolster numbers in the Seminoe Mountain herd and to re-locate a group of sheep who have made their home too close to an area used for domestic sheep. The Game and Fish does not want to risk potential contact of the wild and domestic sheep, Hurley said, because of possible spreading of disease.

The two choppers were seen trawling in and out of the canyon, the volume of their droning engines echoing and giving away their location as they climbed above the canyon walls.

 While the group watched in fascination from below, a helicopter crew radioed to the staging area that they had spotted a group of sheep in a cave in Cottonwood Canyon. A few moments later, a distant report was audible as the gunman shot a net at the sheep from above.

A second chopper then disappeared behind a canyon wall to drop off a “mugger,” who was responsible for blindfolding and constraining the sheep’s’ legs with straps (or hobbles) and freeing them from the nets before loading them into the helicopter or into a mesh bag dangling below the chopper.

Lovell Game Warden Rick King rode along in a helicopter as a mugger, spotting sheep from the air and hopping out to prepare them for the airlift.

“They were pretty docile when they were in the net,” he said. “It was pretty easy to get hobbles on them and the blindfold calmed them down.”

King said it was somewhat difficult to spot the sheep at first, but once they got going the capture went quickly. He said the new experience would be a highlight of his career.

“The Leading Edge (helicopter) crew is amazing,” he said. “The pilots are very talented and remarkable to watch.”

Sky aviation of Worland provided a second helicopter for the operation.

After climbing out and above the canyon, one of the helicopters descended on the staging area, landing briefly while a man inside passed the first ewe to a crew of a few men on the ground that carried the sheep to a tarp. The beating helicopter blades blasted snow into the crowd as workers held flapping tarps while the first sheep was delivered to the staging area.

Game and Fish took samples from each animal including a nose swab, throat swab, blood sample, fecal sample and temperature, Hurley said. Radio collars were affixed to the animals as well.

Observers were asked to be quiet and not to crowd the scene as samples were taken.

“We want it generally very quiet,” Hurley said, adding that it was OK to get close to take pictures briefly.

After samples were taken, the sheep were picked up, with one man controlling each sheep’s head, and loaded into a nearby enclosed livestock trailer, aptly named “Ewe Haul.”

A team of four people held firmly onto the animal as they carefully removed the hobbles and blindfold, half holding the sheep and half pushing it into the open door of the trailer, shrouded by heavy rubber curtains. The men blocked the open door while swinging the metal door shut and securing it. Some sheep banged around in the trailer once they were inside.

Nine lambs and ewes were loaded into a separate trailer from the three rams that were captured.

The sheep were held overnight in Lander before being released into the Seminoe Mountains the following day, according to the Game and Fish.

They joined a group of Big Horn Sheep that had been transplanted in the Seminoes from Oregon on Dec. 4. According to a Lander Game and Fish employee who scouted for the sheep recently, the Oregon sheep are doing well.

One ewe did die during the Oregon capture-release operation. Hurley said the department does all it can do to avoid injury or death, but it still happens sometimes. He said the temperature change from 50 degrees to -10 in the mountains near Rawlins also made it tough for the ewe to survive.

Friday’s operation at Cottonwood Canyon went according to plan, with no major injuries to animals or humans, according to the Game and Fish.

King said he talked to the Rawlins game warden Tuesday. He said the release went well and the sheep looked healthy upon delivery. Teams would be out this week to track the sheep by radio collar to make sure they’re doing OK, King said.

Much of the funding for the transplant comes from the Wyoming Governor’s Big Game License Coalition Big Horn Sheep Account. Additional funds came from the Wyoming Chapter of the Foundation for North American Wild Sheep (FNAWS), Eastern FNAWS, Minessota/Wisconsin FNAWS, and the Wild Sheep Foundation.