The news has been well received that the SkyRider Wilderness Ranch in Duchesne County will become Utah’s first desert bighorn sheep nursery in Utah. Among other questions, some have asked where the sheep for the nursery will come from. The DWR shared that they have partnered with the Nevada Department of Wildlife to get the initial desert bighorn sheep for the nursery herd and that the nursery area can support roughly 150 bighorn sheep. “We will maintain a viable number of desert bighorn sheep on this property and the additional animals will be relocated to other Utah areas to help supplement those bighorn sheep populations or to start new herds,” shares DWR Once-In-A-Lifetime Species Coordinator Riley Peck. “We are so grateful to Young Living, the Nevada Department of Wildlife, Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife and the Wild Sheep Foundation for their partnership in these crucial conservation efforts. We are very appreciative of the generosity of the Nevada Department of Wildlife for giving Utah hundreds of bighorn sheep over the years to repopulate our herds.”
