University Researcher Tests New Wild Sheep Vaccine

A Washington State University (WSU) wildlife disease researcher produced an experimental vaccine that appears to have protected four bighorn sheep against deadly pneumonia.

Subramaniam Srikumaran, the WSU professor in Pullman, Wash., says his findings are promising but concedes years of work remain to help safeguard bighorn herds from periodic die-offs that have plagued the species in Idaho.

His research comes at a time when domestic sheep that roam the same habitat as bighorns are blamed for spreading disease to their more vulnerable wild cousins. That's led federal managers to close sheep grazing allotments in Idaho's Payette National Forest to protect the wild sheep. That move has angered the region's ranchers who see the federal government as protecting wildlife over their livelihoods.

Srikumaran told the Lewiston Tribune this week that he developed the vaccine in his laboratory then gave it to four bighorn sheep. They all survived after being exposed to a pathogen that causes pneumonia. Sheep not given the vaccine died within days of exposure. He acknowledged the sample size of inoculated bighorns was small, but "100 percent is something convincing to me."

Idaho bighorn numbers have dwindled by half since 1990, to about 3,500. Die-offs such as ones where 300 sheep died in 1995 and 1996 in Hells Canyon have contributed to the declines. Most scientists believe contact between the wild sheep and domestic sheep during the spring and summer has contributed to transmission of deadly pneumonia.

Some see a vaccine along the lines of what Srikumaran is working on as a solution to allowing historic ranching activities and wild sheep to coexist in the high country - not just in Idaho but in other states including Washington and California where similar efforts to separate the animals are under consideration.

Wildlife biologists following the debate say a solution remains elusive despite the positive rumblings from Srikumaran's lab. For instance, relying on a vaccine given to wild sheep can be problematic, because it probably would require capturing all the wild animals that live in steep and remote terrain.

That's one reason why Srikumaran is also working on a method that would treat the domestic sheep that are rounded up annually instead of the bighorns.

Frances Cassirer, a wildlife research biologist for the Idaho Department of Fish and Game in Lewiston, said Srikumaran's experimental vaccine may prove a valuable tool in the fight to learn more about what causes wild sheep to contract pneumonia from domestics or if there is more than one cause.

For instance, Srikumaran exposed the sheep to a pathogen known to be deadly, but some researchers believe there is another bacteria that weakens the bighorns' immune systems and makes them more susceptible to deadly bacteria.

"If you could inoculate bighorn with the vaccine and expose them to domestic sheep and they survived, at least you would know that is the organism; it suggests that is the organism we have to get rid of in domestic sheep," Cassirer said.

Reprinted in part from Seattle Post Intelligencer