PRESS RELEASE  

Texas Group Funds West Texas Sheep Habitat

Austin, Texas
 

At a meeting held here May 26, 2005, the Texas Bighorn Society, a statewide, non-profit group dedicated to the preservation of wild bighorn sheep populations in west Texas, presented the Texas Parks & Wildlife Commission with a check for $200,000.00 

The funds are slated to finance the consolidation of land holdings within the Black Gap Wildlife Management Area, lands that are critical desert bighorn habitat. The property in question also represents a vital travel corridor between existing bighorn sheep populations in Black Gap WMA and sheep populations being introduced in Mexico, by the CEMEX Corporation, and future transplants scheduled for Big Bend Ranch State Park, to the west.  

This first-ever habitat acquisition by TBS represents another huge investment by this small, non-profit conservation organization in the bighorn restoration effort in Texas.

According to Clay Brewer, TP&W Program Leader for Bighorns, Mule Deer, and Antelope, “Without the support of TBS, we would not have bighorn sheep in Texas!”  

With the Texas bighorn herd now approaching 800 free-ranging animals, numbers not seen since the late 1800’s, this is no small feat. To date, TBS has invested nearly $1.5 million and thousands of hours of volunteer labor to restore the magnificent bighorn sheep to its native west Texas habitat. The last of Texas’ native desert bighorns disappeared from the state about 1960.