Research overview: puma predation on bighorn sheep

A survey of how cougar predation can threaten small and recovering populations of desert and mountain bighorn sheep. Although bighorn are not preferred prey, individual pumas can specialize on sheep, and even low predation rates can imperil isolated herds already stressed by disease and habitat loss. This overview synthesizes evidence on the conditions that elevate puma predation on bighorn, such as proximity to deer-rich cover and the behavior of specialist individuals, and the management responses including targeted removal and habitat manipulation. It connects to broader questions of how generalist predators affect rare prey and how a single predator's prey choice can have outsized conservation consequences. The topic illustrates the tension between recovering both predators and vulnerable native prey in arid western landscapes.