How big are these sheep? An average male can weigh over 300 pounds with horns over 5 feet wide, giving them the largest sheep horns on the planet. The sheep are endangered and protected by both international treaties and U.S. law. Montana also forbids the import of these foreign sheep or their parts in an effort to protect local American sheep from disease.
There must be more to it from what they said he did that was illegal. Not a lawyer though:
The interesting thing is that American sheep shouldn’t be subject to disease if they’re using cloned specimens and all parts are disposed of properly. It’s probably technically against the law, but it seems there should be an exemption for conservation (i.e. if hunters can hunt Argali on a US ranch legally, most probably wouldn’t bother going to Asia).
I just wonder what the legal process is here, if there is one. Could he have gotten a permit to raise these sheep for conservation purposes? For example, this story about a private conservationist trying to save rhinos from poaching makes me extremely sad because the best way to stop poaching is to fill the demand through legal, sustainable means so poaching is no longer profitable. I’m still not a fan of de-horning rhinos, but it’s better than them being hunted to extinction.
So I wonder if this form of conservation has or will have a legal path.
I doubt that an individual will ever be able to do it legally, the government tends to ban stuff they don’t understand or know how to control. Especially if it’s international stuff.