Associated Press - Nov. 25, 2003
ANCHORAGE, Alaska - A magnificent, full-curl Dall sheep
was killed by someone who likely pulled to the edge of the Seward Highway
and shot the animal with a high-powered rifle or gun, state wildlife
officials said.
The sheep, nicknamed "Old One Eye," had been
impressing photographers and wildlife watchers for several years. His
body was found between Girdwood and Anchorage on Wednesday.
"It kind of makes me sick," said Alaska Bureau
of Wildlife Enforcement trooper Marc Cloward. Chugach State Park chief
ranger Mike Godwin was the first to notice that the animal, discovered
along the roadway, had been shot in the rump.
Alaska Department of Fish and Game biologists had at
first thought the 10 to 12-year-old
ram might have slipped and fallen to its death from the cliffs above
the highway, but the thinking quickly changed when Godwin found the
bullet hole through both buttocks.
"I can't think of anything more offensive," Cloward
said. "This is a slap in the face to every citizen in Anchorage."
Godwin said the impressive sheep was a favorite with
photographers.
"The professional photographers are going to miss
Old One Eye," he said.
The ram was a member of a large and healthy Chugach State
Park sheep population that numbers in the thousands.
It appears someone stopped along the shoulder of the
highway early Wednesday, Nov. 19, and shot the ram off a cliff about
40 yards from the pavement, Alaska State Troopers spokesman Greg Wilkinson
said.
"He shot him through both hindquarters, and he fell
from there," Cloward said. The trooper spent several hours above
the highway scouring the rocks for the bullet, but could find nothing.
"It's a pretty squeaky-clean crime scene," he
said. "I have absolutely nothing to go on, but somebody had to
have seen it."
It is unclear, according to authorities, whether the
shooting was merely a thrill killing, or whether someone wanted the
ram's trophy-size horns. If it was the latter, Cloward said, the culprit
might have left without taking them because one horn broke in the fall
from the cliff.
Fish and Game will keep the horns. The meat of the animal
was recovered by a charity.
