At least eight have died recently in Gila National Forest.

Wildlife officials have confirmed that a particularly virulent strain of bacterial pneumonia has claimed at least eight bighorn sheep in the past three months in the Gila National Forest's Glenwood Ranger District, the Silver City Sun-News reported today on its Web site.

"It's highly contagious, spreads quickly and has the potential to wipe out a herd," Pat Morrison, district ranger for the Glenwood Ranger District told the paper.

Morrison said she had been told by state game officials that the prognosis for the entire herd, estimated at between 100 to 120 animals, was not good, the Sun-News reported.

Daniel R. Patterson, ecologist and deserts program director for the nonprofit Center for Biological Diversity, told the Sun-News the deaths could likely be attributed to contact with domestic sheep or goats, which can carry the disease without feeling its harmful effects.

Patterson urged that BLM guidelines be followed that call for keeping domestic livestock at least nine miles away from any known bighorn herd in order to prevent the transmission of diseases such as bacterial pneumonia, the Sun-News reported.

Luis Rios, southwest area chief of the state Game and Fish Department, told the paper on Monday that the situation may not be as bleak as earlier forecast.

After the first bighorn was found dead last Dec. 30 and another six were found in a matter of days, only one has been found in the past month, Rios told the paper.

"It certainly does appear that we dodged the big bullet," said Rios, who told the Sun-News he believed the herd may have turned a corner on the pneumonia outbreak.

The herd was reintroduced to the area about 40 years ago and experienced a large die-off about 10 years ago, the paper reported.

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