Nevada
Nevada’s state animal may face die-offs, relocation due to drought
A symbol of the persistent spirit of life in the American West, bighorn sheep have long made their home in the country’s driest desert.
Far before white settlers reached Las Vegas, these hearty animals enjoyed Southern Nevada’s bountiful water sources alongside the Nuwu, or Southern Paiute Native Americans. Tribes viewed their lives as intertwined with the sheep’s lives, hunting them but honoring their sacrifice.
But today, as the nation’s driest state grows more arid, the animals face a dire dilemma: a lack of water needed to survive. With more than 200 days of no measurable rain in the Las Vegas Valley and counting, the clock is ticking as the dry streak threatens to cut off their food source and potentially warrant relocation out of state.
“You can provide as much water as you want to, but it’s going to eventually get to the point where there’s not enough groceries on the ground — or vegetation,” Joe Bennett, the Nevada Department of Wildlife’s southern region game supervisor, said in an interview Friday. “I don’t know when we’ll reach that threshold.”
Bennett joined his wildlife department colleagues at a Nevada Board of Wildlife Commissioners meeting last week, emphasizing the need for officials to pay attention to bighorn sheep populations in the coming months.
“If we don’t take action, there definitely will be hundreds of animals that will die,” Mike Cox, the state’s biologist over bighorn sheep and mountain goats, told commissioners in his report.
Huge water guzzlers not enough
Biologists believe the precarious future of Nevada’s beloved desert bighorn sheep is predicated on climate change.
Southern Nevada’s future is a hotter and drier one, Cox said.
The last two decades have brought more intense periods of drought with higher temperatures and longer days without rain, he said. Instead of three out of 10 years under drought conditions, it’s more like five or six dry years out of 10.
“We’re not going in the right direction in terms of our climate,” Cox said. “I started my career in Las Vegas, and I remember the consistent monsoonal patterns.”
The populations most at risk right now reside in the Muddy Mountains and Arrow Canyon Range near Moapa, McCullough Range on the outskirts of Henderson and the southern Spotted Range near Indian Springs, Cox said.
Boulder City’s beloved herd that mingles alongside humans at Hemenway Park in the River Mountains isn’t on that list, largely because of its proximity to Lake Mead and plenty of year-round grazing.
Extreme drought last hit the bighorn sheep populations from 2020 to 2022, when biologists saw herds move eastward in the Muddy Mountains. That shift in population density has strained water resources even more, Cox said.
In times of extreme dryness, the state wildlife department will conduct water hauls to so-called water guzzlers, or 9,000-to-11,500-gallon tanks that provide drinking water. The state has access to remote sensing technology that shows water levels at each guzzler, and officials said they are planning another water haul this month.
“They’re having to stay on these guzzlers longer,” said Bennett, the game supervisor. “They’re not able to move off of them and use resources that are further away that they would normally use during the winter months.”
Solutions still in the works
It’s not clear yet what route wildlife officials will take to reduce deaths among bighorn sheep in Southern Nevada.
Even with available water, dried-out vegetation isn’t cutting it — and officials aren’t aware of any proven solutions to artificially supplying food sources.
Trans-locating some of the most affected bighorn sheep to either Northern Nevada or out of state to Utah is an option they are considering, Bennett said.
One drawback is that several of the sub-populations suffer from pneumonia strains — an emerging challenge the department has been tracking for at least a decade. Officials don’t want to spread disease, and each herd has its own circumstances, he said.
“We just have to make sure, wherever we likely move them, that we’re not putting them in a bad situation,” Bennett said.
The state wildlife department, along with non-governmental organizations focused on bighorn sheep, will meet and formulate a plan to best manage bighorn sheep populations in the near future. Officials said a more official plan will be presented at the next board meeting scheduled for March 7 and 8.
While no immediate intervention is necessary to sustain the populations, this challenge of drought and disease is one that biologists across the West will grapple with for decades to come.
“That’s the balancing act that we biologists have to play,” Bennett said.
Contact Alan Halaly at ahalaly@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AlanHalaly on X.
LAS VEGAS (AP) — Nevadans are choosing their party nominees Tuesday for two closely watched congressional seats and the governor’s race, among others, as the state grapples with an affordable housing shortage, exploding energy demand from data centers and federal cuts to key state programs.
The state has a closed primary, meaning only registered Democrats and Republicans will vote in party contests after an effort to open them up failed in 2024.
Several primaries feature matchups between candidates backed by party leaders and political outsiders promising change. Come November, the governor’s race is considered one of the most competitive in the country, and holding on to the 3rd Congressional District is considered crucial for Democrats’ hope of retaking the U.S. House.
Here’s a look at the most prominent races:
Democrats seek a rival for Lombardo
Gov. Joe Lombardo, a Republican, is considered one of the most vulnerable governors in the country this fall.
The Democrats vying to challenge him include state Attorney General Aaron Ford, who has the backing of the Democratic congressional delegation and former Vice President Kamala Harris, and Alexis Hill, a county commissioner in northern Nevada who campaigned as a candidate willing to shake things up.
They focused their campaigns on affordability, as the state continues to see a shortage of affordable housing, some of the highest gas prices in the country and cuts to federal healthcare and food assistance programs.
Ford largely ignored Hill, instead directing his attacks at Lombardo and arguing that both the governor and Trump are responsible for Nevadans’ economic woes. He is trying to become Nevada’s first Black governor.
2nd Congressional District
In the Republican contest to replace longtime Rep. Mark Amodei, who is retiring, President Donald Trump has endorsed David Flippo, a loyalist of the president who has never held elected office. Amodei and Lombardo have backed James Settelmeyer, a former state senator with a long political track record.
The district covers northern Nevada and includes Reno and Carson City, the capital, along with an immense rural expanse.
Trump-endorsed candidates have seen successful in primaries elsewhere, underscoring his unrivaled power over the Republican Party as he enters the last years of his presidency. He easily won the district in the 2024 presidential election.
The GOP nominee has a good chance of winning in November, as registered Republicans outnumber Democrats by 70,000 in the 2nd District. A Republican has held the seat since the district was created in the 1980s.
Still, Democrats hope to entice the large number of nonpartisan voters in the district this fall. Their candidates include Teresa Benitez-Thompson, a former majority floor leader of the Nevada Assembly, and Greg Kidd, an investor who ran in the last cycle as a nonpartisan.
3rd Congressional District
Nevada’s other three members of Congress, all Democrats, are expected to win their primaries easily.
In the 3rd District, Republicans are battling to determine who will face Democratic Rep. Susie Lee in what is considered the most competitive congressional district in Nevada because of its narrow Democratic registration advantage, its high number of nonpartisan voters and a history of razor-thin election margins. In 2024 both Lee and Trump won narrowly.
Candidates include Trump-backed Marty O’Donnell, a composer who worked on the “Halo” video game series and ran unsuccessfully for the seat in 2024; Jeff Gunter, a dermatologist and former ambassador to Iceland; neurosurgeon Aury Nagy; and businessperson Tera Anderson.
The candidates ran on border security, energy independence and decreasing the federal debt.
Attorney general
With Ford term-limited and running for governor, the opening has prompted competitive primaries for the state’s top law enforcement post.
The Democratic side features state Senate Majority Leader Nicole Cannizzaro and Treasurer Zach Conine. Both campaigned on promises to take on the Trump administration, following in the footsteps of Ford, who filed numerous lawsuits against the federal government.
For the Republicans, Trump-backed attorney Adriana Guzmán Fralick faces Douglas County commissioner Danny Tarkanian. Tarkanian, son of legendary University of Nevada, Las Vegas basketball coach Jerry Tarkanian, previously ran unsuccessfully in multiple congressional races.
Both candidates campaigned on “election integrity,” casting doubt on voting security. Nevada is one of the swing states in which Trump falsely claimed the 2020 election was stolen, despite officials finding no evidence of widespread fraud.
Tarkanian promised to investigate voter fraud allegations, while Guzmán Fralick vowed to seek passage of the SAVE Nevada Act, which would be similar to changes Trump has sought at the federal level.
Her legislation would require all votes to be counted on Election Day, end universal mail ballots and eliminate automatic voter registration. It would almost certainly hit a dead end in the Democratic-controlled Legislature.
GOP secretary of state candidates question Nevada’s elections
Several Republicans are running for secretary of state, the office that oversees elections, including some who falsely claimed the 2020 election was stolen from Trump. The winner of the primary will take on Democratic Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar.
The GOP candidates include Jim Marchant, a former state lawmaker and perennial candidate who has said the 2020 election “was probably stolen”; Sharron Angle, a former state lawmaker who was part of an effort to block the certification of Nevada’s 2020 election results; and Shirley Folkins-Roberts, an attorney who received Lombardo’s endorsement and has denied there is widespread fraud in Nevada’s elections.
All the candidates support implementing voter ID, which will be on the ballot for the second time in November after the question passed by a wide margin in 2024.
Angle promises to enforce voter ID if voters pass it and supports Trump’s executive order seeking to require documentary proof of citizenship to vote. The courts have so far halted that order, issued last year, from taking effect.
Marchant wants to eliminate electronic voting machines and end the state’s universal mail ballot system. He also wants to require paper ballots, which would be counted by hand, according to his campaign website.
Folkins-Roberts said she will work to keep voter rolls accurate and up-to-date, require voter ID and ensure that election results are delivered on time. She also wants to reverse the automatic voter registration system. In an interview with News 4 Reno, Folkins-Roberts said she believes Nevada’s elections are “good,” but wants to improve voters’ confidence by making changes.
LAS VEGAS (KSNV) — We’ll start the week with a heightened fire danger with dangerous heat later this week.
TODAY
Expect mostly sunny skies with winds picking up again on Monday. High temperatures will reach 98 degrees in Las Vegas with south winds 10-20 mph and wind gusts up to 30 mph.
A RED FLAG WARNING is in place from 10am to 9pm Monday for gusty winds and dry weather, so if a fire started, it would spread quickly.
Winds are estimated to be 20-25 mph with gusts around 40 mph at times with relative humidity of 5%-15%.
Air quality is ranked ‘good’ to ‘moderate’ for dust and tree pollen. The most common pollens are juniper, cedar, willow, sycamore and palm.
TONIGHT
We’ll see variable clouds this evening with skies going from mostly cloudy to mostly clear overnight.
Wind gusts will pick up again before midnight with gusts 30-40 mph possible downslope of the Spring Mountains in the west valley.
Elsewhere, gusts will be 20-30 mph. Breezes will eventually back down to 5-15 mph overnight. Valley lows will drop to around 74 degrees.
WHAT’S NEXT
We have reached 109 consecutive days without measurable rain in Las Vegas.
No rain is in sight, but for perspective, June is the driest month of the year in Las Vegas. Fingers crossed on a hopefully more active monsoon season!
High pressure builds next with highs 5-10 degrees above normal. Temperatures will reach around 108 degrees in Las Vegas by Friday. The last time we hit a high temperature of 108 degrees was back on August 20th of last year.
Not much relief is in sight by the weekend with highs around 107 degrees and temps at or above 105-106 degrees NEXT Monday through Wednesday.
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