Fauna Series No. 6

Fauna of the National Parks — No. 6 The Bighorn of Death Valley

LIFE HISTORY OF THE DEATH VALLEY BIGHORN

Activity

Fixed patterns of daily activity are very difficult to trace in bighorn. As with most animals, their time is divided roughly by the business of getting enough to eat, enough to drink, enough rest, and reproducing their kind. In the young, a period of play may occur in the early morning and late evening. But we have found little evidence of daily routine among bighorn. They usually leave their night beds at dawn, but they may "sleep in" until noon. They are likely to take from one to three siestas during the day, but they may take none.

Their activity is governed to a large extent by their relationship to their supplies of food and water, and since availability of these supplies is varied more by wet and dry cycles than by calendar seasons, it is difficult to define seasonal activity by months. The tolerance of high temperature by bighorn has already been established. That they have an equal tolerance for cold is suggested by the facts that a newborn lamb seems impervious to freezing weather and that we have no record of any change of activity because of low temperatures.

An extremely general description of daily activity would run as follows: The bighorn are likely to rise at dawn; if young are present, they may play for a short time and on occasion be joined by adults; they may feed for a period of from 1 to 3 hours, then rest for 1 to 3 hours. Alternating of feeding and resting periods continues throughout the day, with the band usually climbing to a higher elevation for bedding at dusk.

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Last Modified: Thurs, May 16 2002 10:00:00 pm PDT
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