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Bighorn blockade / Animals' taste for de-icer on highway brings safety concerns
By VINCE DEVLIN of the Missoulian
A herd of bighorn sheep stands on Montana Highway 200 just east of Thompson Falls earlier this week, licking up salt-based de-icer from the pavement and causing a minor traffic jam. While most drivers use caution on the stretch of road well-marked for the danger, witnesses say that earlier this month a semitrailer plowed through a herd of bighorn sheep, killing at least seven of them.
Photo by TOM BAUER/Missoulian
THOMPSON FALLS - It was between 9:30 and 10 on the morning of Nov. 10, on a straight stretch of Montana Highway 200 just east of here, that the driver of a trailerless semi from Butte bore down on a herd of bighorn sheep on the highway.
The semi had just passed one of the towable readerboards that warn drivers the sheep congregate on this section of the road.
That say 18 have already been killed this year.
That beg drivers to slow down and use caution.
It's perfect bighorn habitat along this section of the Clark Fork River, what with steep cliffs to protect the sheep from predators, south-facing slopes that stay free of snow in the winter, and open grassy hillsides. Perfect, that is, save for the highway and railroad tracks that run through this sometimes narrow section of Clark Fork Valley bottomland that serves as the sheep's winter range.
The animals gather on Highway 200 at this time of year to lap up the water and slush created when the Montana Department of Transportation puts salt-based de-icer and sand on the road during wintertime driving conditions.
About 50 of them were clogging the highway one morning earlier this week, and once they get to licking up the salt their bodies need, they aren't inclined to move for anyone or anything. A large freight truck had crept up on some of the sheep, horn blaring, and still the bighorns wouldn't budge. The driver of the truck finally stopped about a foot from a couple of lambs and, as traffic lined up behind him, sat there helpless.
In the westbound lane, a car gently nudged a ram in the butt, and once he jumped out of the way, enough of the others reacted to his movement and meandered to the side to create a narrow lane for the car to pass through.
But on the morning of Nov. 10, the driver of the semi didn't appear to slow down one iota.
Witnesses told Bruce Sterling, a wildlife biologist with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, that the semi's brake lights never came on.
In the space of all of two seconds, the bighorn sheep death count on this small stretch of Highway 200 this year leapt from 18 to 25. Blood, guts, hair and horns sprayed through the air; several of the sheep were literally cut in half.
“I didn't get an opportunity to talk to him about why he did it,” Sterling says. “Either he was not paying attention, or he didn't care.”
The driver stopped at a hunter checkpoint farther down the road where Sterling was working.
“He didn't seem too upset about the sheep, but he was upset about the damage done to his vehicle. It seemed to be a total lack of regard for Montana wildlife.”
There is no law against running over wildlife with your vehicle, any more than there's a statute that bans you from driving your car head-on into a concrete wall.
You wouldn't think you'd need one.
“There is no law against striking wildlife,” Sterling says, “mostly because no one would want to because of the damage it can cause. An adult ram can weigh 225 pounds and would do major damage to a vehicle.”
But this was a semi. Sterling says it sustained some damage to its bumper, right light and right fender.
The irony is that most of the places where Department of Transportation crews put down the de-icer and sand - on the hills and sharp curves where it's most needed to help motorists - are the last places you want a herd of bighorn sheep to congregate and snarl traffic.
“It is a fairly major problem,” Sterling says. “There is the potential for a disastrous loss not just of sheep, but of life.”
That was evident earlier this week when cars began backing up behind the freight truck that had come to a stop, unable to move. If many more vehicles were forced to come to a halt on the hill, it wouldn't be long before a driver who ignored the readerboards and instead shot over the crest of the hill at 65 mph wouldn't have time to stop before either crashing into the last car in line, or veering off into the ditch or other lane - both of which were filled with sheep.
“Fortunately, it hasn't happened in the 25 years I've been here,” Sterling says of a sheep-caused human fatality.
Sheep deaths, meanwhile, have topped 350 since Sterling began keeping records in 1985.
Fish, Wildlife and Parks has tried putting salt blocks out away from the highway, but has had very limited success.
“Salt is a natural mineral the sheep routinely seek out,” Sterling says, “and finding it on the road has become a learned behavior over the course of many years. It's difficult to put salt blocks out and expect them to find it.”
They've fired cracker shells near the herd, and the loud explosion works - for about a half hour.
Then they're back, licking up the de-icer again.
“Our saving grace is that the sheep aren't active at night,” Sterling says. “They go up into the cliffs to bed down at night. If they were down on the road at night, I don't know if we'd have any left.”
Unlike the semi that plowed into the herd on a straight stretch - the death toll may have been more than seven; Sterling says any sheep that weren't mortally injured would have crawled off into the brush to die - some of the deaths can't be helped.
“Occasionally, particularly on corners, the sheep are right there before you can do anything and it's certainly unavoidable,” he says. “Or they'll be in the ditch, spook and pop up right in front of you. We typically lose one, maybe two, sheep in an incident.”
But two years ago, when highway construction in the area caused long delays and drivers hurried to make up for lost time or scrambled to get in line before a pace car led motorists through the construction zone, bighorn sheep suffered their worst year along Highway 200 since Sterling started keeping records.
Thirty-seven were killed that year by motorists.
It's just a seven-or-so-mile stretch between Plains and Thompson Falls where all this carnage takes place. Sterling says the most dangerous points lie between mile markers 58 and 59, and 64 and 65.
The sheep show up in October and stick around through December, according to Sterling.
Their numbers decrease in January and February, but they show back up full force in March and April, when they feed on new vegetation on the valley floor.
“The highway absorbs heat, and the vegetation right next to the highway greens up earlier than other places,” Sterling says.
The bighorns generally disappear from the highway after April, though they don't go far, just higher.
“It's mostly an elevational migration,” Sterling says.
And there's still a danger. In spots on curves where the road slopes, the de-icer over the years has run to the low side of the road and saturated the soil, and the bighorns will occasionally show up and root around next to the highway during the summer months in search of salt.
The salt is simply something they need in their diets, Sterling says, and it's no different than when you find your dog eating blades of grass - there is something there the animal requires biologically.
Sterling says he knows of no chemicals in the de-icer that pose any hazard to the animals.
Sheep on the road aren't the only potential hazard, either. So are the people who stop along the highway to photograph them. A local highway patrolman concerned with the problem and a local landowner helped bring about the Koo-Koo-Sint Bighorn Sheep Viewing Area off the highway outside Thompson Falls to help alleviate that problem.
But what about the sheep on the highway?
Sterling has a couple of ideas he's just started researching.
One is to capture some of the sheep and put radio collars on them that would transmit a signal to warning lights flashing along the highway any time the sheep are on, or in the vicinity of, the road.
“People get accustomed to the readerboards,” he says. “You can drive by them eight times, slow down, and never see a single sheep, and the ninth time you figure you won't again and then there they are, 15 sheep on the highway.”
Putting radio collars on sheep and transmitting signals to flashing signs is in use in a spot in Arizona that has similar problems with desert bighorns, Sterling says.
“But it's expensive, and labor intensive,” he adds. “You can't just capture sheep once, you have to be continually capturing sheep in the herd and putting collars on them.”
He's also investigating whether non-salt-based liquid de-icers might work.
“I don't know if they are effective in this climate,” he says, “but it might be worth experimenting with some to see.”
Charity Watt Levis, public information officer with the Montana Department of Transportation, says her department would certainly be open to discussing it.
“Absolutely,” she says. “We're always trying to balance safety issues. We'd be open to discussions weighing the benefits and risks.”
After the slaughter of Nov. 10, it may be time. There are an estimated 250 bighorn sheep in this Clark Fork Valley herd, and earlier this week, as Sterling drove through the area, he saw so many sheep he stopped to add them up.
By the time he was finished, he'd counted 210.
Of that, 190 of them were congregated in the highway right-of-way or on the road, attracted to the salt they crave. An amazing sight, to be sure.
But also a potentially deadly one.
Reporter Vince Devlin can be reached at 1-800-366-7186 or at [email protected]
By VINCE DEVLIN of the Missoulian
A herd of bighorn sheep stands on Montana Highway 200 just east of Thompson Falls earlier this week, licking up salt-based de-icer from the pavement and causing a minor traffic jam. While most drivers use caution on the stretch of road well-marked for the danger, witnesses say that earlier this month a semitrailer plowed through a herd of bighorn sheep, killing at least seven of them.
Photo by TOM BAUER/Missoulian
THOMPSON FALLS - It was between 9:30 and 10 on the morning of Nov. 10, on a straight stretch of Montana Highway 200 just east of here, that the driver of a trailerless semi from Butte bore down on a herd of bighorn sheep on the highway.
The semi had just passed one of the towable readerboards that warn drivers the sheep congregate on this section of the road.
That say 18 have already been killed this year.
That beg drivers to slow down and use caution.
It's perfect bighorn habitat along this section of the Clark Fork River, what with steep cliffs to protect the sheep from predators, south-facing slopes that stay free of snow in the winter, and open grassy hillsides. Perfect, that is, save for the highway and railroad tracks that run through this sometimes narrow section of Clark Fork Valley bottomland that serves as the sheep's winter range.
The animals gather on Highway 200 at this time of year to lap up the water and slush created when the Montana Department of Transportation puts salt-based de-icer and sand on the road during wintertime driving conditions.
About 50 of them were clogging the highway one morning earlier this week, and once they get to licking up the salt their bodies need, they aren't inclined to move for anyone or anything. A large freight truck had crept up on some of the sheep, horn blaring, and still the bighorns wouldn't budge. The driver of the truck finally stopped about a foot from a couple of lambs and, as traffic lined up behind him, sat there helpless.
In the westbound lane, a car gently nudged a ram in the butt, and once he jumped out of the way, enough of the others reacted to his movement and meandered to the side to create a narrow lane for the car to pass through.
But on the morning of Nov. 10, the driver of the semi didn't appear to slow down one iota.
Witnesses told Bruce Sterling, a wildlife biologist with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, that the semi's brake lights never came on.
In the space of all of two seconds, the bighorn sheep death count on this small stretch of Highway 200 this year leapt from 18 to 25. Blood, guts, hair and horns sprayed through the air; several of the sheep were literally cut in half.
“I didn't get an opportunity to talk to him about why he did it,” Sterling says. “Either he was not paying attention, or he didn't care.”
The driver stopped at a hunter checkpoint farther down the road where Sterling was working.
“He didn't seem too upset about the sheep, but he was upset about the damage done to his vehicle. It seemed to be a total lack of regard for Montana wildlife.”
There is no law against running over wildlife with your vehicle, any more than there's a statute that bans you from driving your car head-on into a concrete wall.
You wouldn't think you'd need one.
“There is no law against striking wildlife,” Sterling says, “mostly because no one would want to because of the damage it can cause. An adult ram can weigh 225 pounds and would do major damage to a vehicle.”
But this was a semi. Sterling says it sustained some damage to its bumper, right light and right fender.
The irony is that most of the places where Department of Transportation crews put down the de-icer and sand - on the hills and sharp curves where it's most needed to help motorists - are the last places you want a herd of bighorn sheep to congregate and snarl traffic.
“It is a fairly major problem,” Sterling says. “There is the potential for a disastrous loss not just of sheep, but of life.”
That was evident earlier this week when cars began backing up behind the freight truck that had come to a stop, unable to move. If many more vehicles were forced to come to a halt on the hill, it wouldn't be long before a driver who ignored the readerboards and instead shot over the crest of the hill at 65 mph wouldn't have time to stop before either crashing into the last car in line, or veering off into the ditch or other lane - both of which were filled with sheep.
“Fortunately, it hasn't happened in the 25 years I've been here,” Sterling says of a sheep-caused human fatality.
Sheep deaths, meanwhile, have topped 350 since Sterling began keeping records in 1985.
Fish, Wildlife and Parks has tried putting salt blocks out away from the highway, but has had very limited success.
“Salt is a natural mineral the sheep routinely seek out,” Sterling says, “and finding it on the road has become a learned behavior over the course of many years. It's difficult to put salt blocks out and expect them to find it.”
They've fired cracker shells near the herd, and the loud explosion works - for about a half hour.
Then they're back, licking up the de-icer again.
“Our saving grace is that the sheep aren't active at night,” Sterling says. “They go up into the cliffs to bed down at night. If they were down on the road at night, I don't know if we'd have any left.”
Unlike the semi that plowed into the herd on a straight stretch - the death toll may have been more than seven; Sterling says any sheep that weren't mortally injured would have crawled off into the brush to die - some of the deaths can't be helped.
“Occasionally, particularly on corners, the sheep are right there before you can do anything and it's certainly unavoidable,” he says. “Or they'll be in the ditch, spook and pop up right in front of you. We typically lose one, maybe two, sheep in an incident.”
But two years ago, when highway construction in the area caused long delays and drivers hurried to make up for lost time or scrambled to get in line before a pace car led motorists through the construction zone, bighorn sheep suffered their worst year along Highway 200 since Sterling started keeping records.
Thirty-seven were killed that year by motorists.
It's just a seven-or-so-mile stretch between Plains and Thompson Falls where all this carnage takes place. Sterling says the most dangerous points lie between mile markers 58 and 59, and 64 and 65.
The sheep show up in October and stick around through December, according to Sterling.
Their numbers decrease in January and February, but they show back up full force in March and April, when they feed on new vegetation on the valley floor.
“The highway absorbs heat, and the vegetation right next to the highway greens up earlier than other places,” Sterling says.
The bighorns generally disappear from the highway after April, though they don't go far, just higher.
“It's mostly an elevational migration,” Sterling says.
And there's still a danger. In spots on curves where the road slopes, the de-icer over the years has run to the low side of the road and saturated the soil, and the bighorns will occasionally show up and root around next to the highway during the summer months in search of salt.
The salt is simply something they need in their diets, Sterling says, and it's no different than when you find your dog eating blades of grass - there is something there the animal requires biologically.
Sterling says he knows of no chemicals in the de-icer that pose any hazard to the animals.
Sheep on the road aren't the only potential hazard, either. So are the people who stop along the highway to photograph them. A local highway patrolman concerned with the problem and a local landowner helped bring about the Koo-Koo-Sint Bighorn Sheep Viewing Area off the highway outside Thompson Falls to help alleviate that problem.
But what about the sheep on the highway?
Sterling has a couple of ideas he's just started researching.
One is to capture some of the sheep and put radio collars on them that would transmit a signal to warning lights flashing along the highway any time the sheep are on, or in the vicinity of, the road.
“People get accustomed to the readerboards,” he says. “You can drive by them eight times, slow down, and never see a single sheep, and the ninth time you figure you won't again and then there they are, 15 sheep on the highway.”
Putting radio collars on sheep and transmitting signals to flashing signs is in use in a spot in Arizona that has similar problems with desert bighorns, Sterling says.
“But it's expensive, and labor intensive,” he adds. “You can't just capture sheep once, you have to be continually capturing sheep in the herd and putting collars on them.”
He's also investigating whether non-salt-based liquid de-icers might work.
“I don't know if they are effective in this climate,” he says, “but it might be worth experimenting with some to see.”
Charity Watt Levis, public information officer with the Montana Department of Transportation, says her department would certainly be open to discussing it.
“Absolutely,” she says. “We're always trying to balance safety issues. We'd be open to discussions weighing the benefits and risks.”
After the slaughter of Nov. 10, it may be time. There are an estimated 250 bighorn sheep in this Clark Fork Valley herd, and earlier this week, as Sterling drove through the area, he saw so many sheep he stopped to add them up.
By the time he was finished, he'd counted 210.
Of that, 190 of them were congregated in the highway right-of-way or on the road, attracted to the salt they crave. An amazing sight, to be sure.
But also a potentially deadly one.
Reporter Vince Devlin can be reached at 1-800-366-7186 or at [email protected]
