Two more bighorn sheep have died in the Catalina Mountains and a mountain lion was killed for preying on sheep, state wildlife officials confirmed Wednesday.
The sheep deaths were confirmed on Sunday and on Tuesday.
Fifteen of the 31 bighorns relocated from the Yuma area to the Catalinas in November are now dead.
The bighorn found dead Sunday was a ewe, and wildlife officers determined that it was the victim of a mountain lion, said Mark Hart, spokesman for the Arizona Game and Fish Department. The agency is overseeing an effort to rebuild a bighorn herd that disappeared from the Catalinas north of Tucson in the 1990s.
"The lion was trailed directly from the sheep carcass and taken (killed) within a half mile of the kill site" by a department-authorized hunter, Hart said. "We think this was a lion that has killed up to three other (GPS) collared sheep because of the size of the track as well as the timing and proximity to recent sheep deaths."
It's the third mountain lion killed for preying on sheep since the relocation in November.
The bighorn found dead Tuesday was a ram, reducing the number of rams in the remaining group of sheep to two, Hart said. He said the cause of the ram's death is under investigation.
It would be "premature" to decide whether to go ahead with a planned relocation of 30 additional bighorns to the Catalinas in the fall, Hart said.
