The Latest

Fresh on the heels of a 2025 fiscal year with record convention proceeds ($4+ Million), record contributions to the Wild Sheep Legacy Foundation Endowment Fund ($2.2 Million), and a record directed to wild sheep conservation and other WSF Mission Programs (a staggering $11.53 Million), Sheep Fever sits down with WSF Board of Directors Chair, Charlie Kelly and Vice Chair Kyle Stelter to look to the future for wild sheep.

Following the close of its most recent fiscal year, the Wild Sheep Foundation (WSF) released its 10-year Mission Program Funding report, which shows over $70 Million directed by WSF to wild sheep conservation and management, hunting advocacy, public outreach, and education.

In this episode, we drill deeper into this topic with Shane Mahoney, president and CEO of Conservation Visions. We begin by reflecting on a quote from Aldo Leopold’s book, A Sand County Almanac, published in 1949. Emotion is trumping science, sound conservation actions are being pulled in all directions or tied up in court, and harmful measures are showing up on ballot initiative.

In this episode of Sheep Fever, we talk with Conservation Visions president and CEO Shane Mahoney about where conservation is today, what it is facing, how it is being pulled in all directions, and the need, for the lack of a better term, a conservation template that puts wildlife, the environment, and people all in the same house. After all, we are living in the same house.

In this episode, Sheep Fever co-host Gray Thornton visits with Corey on his background and family, professional career, and plans and goals at WSF. Corey also shares some of his past experiences and perspectives on conservation, policy, work in international arenas and many of the relationships built and maintained along the way. 

In this episode of Sheep Fever, co-host Gray N. Thornton speaks with WSF’s “Tres Amigos of Conservation” - VP of Conservation Kevin Hurley, Conservation Director Kurt Alt, and retired Conservation Director Clay Brewer, on the topic of "growing" wild sheep.

Change is inevitable. Sportsmen and women have had the lead in wildlife conservation. How do we maintain this lead? These are all good questions. Some, but not all, were answered in this episode. Like conservation itself, this topic is on a continuum.

Conservation has increasingly become a global topic and a global effort. In this episode, Sheep Fever co-host Keith Balford visits with Shane Mahoney, CEO of Conservation Visions, to discuss various topics, including the growing connectivity between conservation efforts here in North America and those happening beyond our borders. 

Sheep Fever co-host Gray Thornton visits with Working Dogs for Conservation (WD4C) Executive Director Dr. Pete Coppolillo and WSF Vice President of Conservation Kevin Hurley to discuss how these four-legged friends are making an impact on wild sheep conservation, trap & translocations, and test and remove programs throughout the west.

While at the 2023 Sheep Show, Keith sat down with Dan Cabela and Conservation Visions president and CEO Shane Mahoney to talk about Dan’s new television series, Hard Truths, airing on a much more diverse platform, the History Channel.

Keith sits down with Steve Williams, past Chief of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, and current president of the Wildlife Management Institute to discuss how this cornerstone of wildlife management came about, its contributions over the past century, and what challenges we face in keeping science at the forefront of wildlife policy and management.