According to Visher (1914:88), mountain sheep formerly inhabited all the
areas of buttes in Harding County but were extirpated in the 1890's.
Sheep Mountain, a large butte just below the south end of the Slim
Buttes, was reported to be the last area in which these animals
occurred. Over and Churchill (1945:54) mentioned both the Cave Hills and
Slim Buttes as localities formerly inhabited by _O. c. auduboni_.
Early in 1961, the South Dakota Game Commission introduced 12 animals,
four rams and eight ewes, from Alberta (subspecies _O. c. canadensis_)
on the Slim Buttes, but none is known to have survived to 1968.