GLENWOOD SPRINGS – A pair of viewing scopes set up at the No Name rest area offers an up-close view of the bighorn sheep that seem to cling precariously on the sheer slopes of Glenwood Canyon. They may also shed some light on a herd barely clinging to survival in the canyon.

“It’s a species that just about anybody would look at and would draw some kind of emotion from them,” said Phil Nyland, a wildlife biologist with the White River National Forest. “You don’t look at a bighorn sheep and say, ‘Yeah, whatever.'”

The herd is an eye-catching attraction in Glenwood Canyon, especially during winter months when cold temperatures bring them close to Interstate 70 and capture the attention of passing motorists.

Newly installed viewing scopes appear to bring them even closer. The U.S. Forest Service teamed with the state Division of Wildlife, the Department of Transportation, the Bureau of Land Management and the city of Glenwood Springs to put in the two viewing scopes.

The bighorns gambol over imposing terrain, scratching out an existence in forbidding conditions on the south-facing slopes alongside the highway.

Stop by in morning or evening hours during the winter and viewers have a good chance of catching a good glimpse of the herd.

“They’re really an interesting animal, how they can climb and making a living on those craggy places,” Nyland said.

But the herd’s grip on survival seems even more tenuous than its grip on the rocky cliff faces. The original herd had dwindled to just about nothing. In the 1970s as the interstate was being blazed through, the last sheep – about a half-dozen – were moved above Basalt. The DOW began to reintroduce them in the 1980s and ’90s.

Without state efforts, they probably wouldn’t survive, said Perry Wills, area wildlife manager for the DOW, and even with help, they’re barely making it. The herd remains at about 30 sheep, many of them fitted with radio collars to help biologists track them from the canyon to the uplands of the Flat Tops where they spend their summers.

“I’d say they’re sustaining and that’s about it,” Wills said. “They’re certainly not increasing.”

Biologists say they’re not sure why the sheep are struggling so much, but they have some guesses. One is disease. Herds of domesticated sheep roaming the same landscape as bighorns are often blamed for passing on diseases like pneumonia and brucellosis through nose-to-nose contact. Sheep herders often dispute the allegations.

“(Sheep grazing) is a valid use,” Nyland said, “but there’s documented evidence across bighorn range that domesticated sheep can pass on diseases to wild sheep that wild sheep are not resistant to.”

Rams – the male sheep – stand the best chance of surviving disease, Wills said, and that could explain why they number so many in the herd. Of the 30 sheep, only about a third are ewes, or female sheep, Wills said. The rest are rams or lambs. He’d like to see more ewes to improve the herd’s chances of survival.

Another possible culprit is habitat. Noxious weeds, including cheat grass, dominate the lower elevations, probably because the seeds are spread by passing traffic on the interstate, Nyland said. Bighorns, which are grazers, prefer native vegetation.

With a price tag of about $2,000 each, the viewing scopes are intended to bring the bighorns – Colorado’s state mammal – into closer focus. One is wheelchair-accessible.

Viewers might also catch a glimpse of peregrine falcons, elk, mule deer, ravens, songbirds and other animals. Interpretive signs near the Vapor Caves at the entrance to the Glenwood Canyon bike path detail efforts to monitor the herd and improve its habitat.

Wildlife officials hope the scopes will also make the public a little more sensitive to the bighorn’s plight.

“Things like salamanders may not be the best watchable wildlife… but bighorn sheep in Glenwood Canyon, it just makes a great theater for watching bighorn sheep,” Nyland said.

dfrey@aspendailynews.com