This interview originally aired on "In the Moment" on SDPB Radio.
It likely started with a chance encounter: A meeting between a domestic sheep and one of the bighorn sheep who had wandered out of Badlands National Park.
Maybe the sheep touched noses, then went their separate ways. But in addition to comingling, they exchanged germs. And the bighorn carried those germs back to the herd.
Certified wildlife biologist Bill Severud, Ph.D., is assistant professor at South Dakota State University. He discusses the pneumonia outbreak impacting bighorns and how a canine solution could catch and even prevent this illness.
