We recently partnered with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, Mojave Desert Land Trust, Society for the Conservation of Bighorn Sheep, and California Wild Sheep Foundation to install a new wildlife drinker (also known as a guzzler) in Mojave Trails National Monument.
The desert bighorn, Ovis canadensis nelsoni, is a subspecies of bighorn sheep (Ovis canadensis) that is found in the desert mountains of eastern California, much of Nevada, northwestern Arizona, and southern Utah.
Water is critical to bighorn survival. In years with plentiful winter rains, they can get enough water from the grass they eat to go without drinking during spring months. At other times, they must trek to a water source at least every third day. Lactating ewes (female sheep) need to drink almost every day. Making the trek to water is the most dangerous part of a bighorn’s life. It is in narrow canyons, where most seeps and springs occur, that the adult sheep’s only significant predator, the mountain lion, often lies in wait.
With drought conditions worsening and becoming more frequent due to climate change, many natural seeps and springs are drying up or have already dried up. This new water source will hopefully become a new and much-needed “oasis” for the desert bighorn sheep that travel between Mojave Trails National Monument and the Mojave National Preserve. With just the few rainstorms that occurred in this region in the month of February, the system collected about 1,500 gallons!
Shown at top: Assistant Policy Director Linda Castro and Krystian Lahage (Public Policy Officer for Mojave Desert Land Trust) gathering rocks to help hide the less natural-looking parts of the system.
Other photos:
Photo of Krystian and Linda popping their heads out of the water tank before it was completely installed.
One of the drinkers filled with water after recent rains (photo by Debbie Miller Marschke)
