Another Ram Pic

[Bear Creek Adventures]

Desert Sheep,

First of all, welcome to HuntandLodge! It is great to have new hunters here, especially sheep hunters. I have not been lucky enough to draw a sheep tag yet (after 15 years of trying) but I get to go on a sheep hunt every year by guiding hunters here in NM.

Moosie is right, that is a great picture. Where did you get him? Tell us the story.

 

[Muledeer4me]

Desert Sheep welcome to moosies. Really nice Picture thanks for sharing that with us.

 

[Desert Sheep]

(this is long)
The picture in my profile is of the rocky mountain bighorn I shot this past year in CO. The hunting unit is only 45 minutes from where I live, so I got to scout it a lot prior to the season.

The unit's biggest drawback is the lack of public land and the un-willingness of the landowners to let you hunt sheep on their property at a resonable price. I don't make a lot of $, so I was restricted to the limited public land. Which in the long run worked out good.

I as well as one of the other tag holders in the unit had seen this ram with 7 others a week before the season opened. The day before the season opened we scounted the area where the sheep had been, but they weren't there. We then scouted another area and found some sheep, deep in the canyon. So we decided to spend opening day where we had seen sheep.

The next morning we found the sheep again and finally got a good look at them. There wasn't anything huge, so I passed on them. We did see the third tag holder shoot his sheep across the canyon on the private hunting club land. We later caught up to him at his camp and checked out his sheep.

We then went back to the area where I had seen the sheep the week before. We ran into the other tag holder and he said he had hiked all over the area and didn't see a single sheep. So we went to another part of the unit to look around and when we came back to where the other hunter was sitting before, we spotted a lone 5/8 curl ram. I passed on this ram as well.

The following am, we went back to where we had seen the lone ram. The other hunter showed up and he hiked across a saddle to the north. We headed to the west end of the public land and worked our way back to the east. We glassed a ridge where I had seen some other rams earlier in the year and all of a sudden I started seeing white sheep butts appear on the ridge. As we started off the ridge we were on to go after the sheep, we hear a shot.

The other hunter had been watching the sheep and had shot one. We watched to see which way the sheep would go, but we never saw them leave the area. So we headed over to where the sheep had been.

When we got there, we saw the other hunter's sheep across the canyon, but no hunters. They had gone back to their truck to get their packs. I continued up the ridge and then saw the sheep bedded in the bottom of the canyon.

We looked them all over and I picked out the one I wanted. I shot the ram in his bed from 176 yards. He never got up. All the other rams bunched up and stood around and fortunately there wasn't another ram bigger than the one I shot.

I also took a desert bighorn sheep in CO in 95', thus my handle. Plus I also drew a mountain goat in CO last year. You could say I have good luck drawing tags. Now if I could only draw that moose tag and MT sheep tag.

 

[Twofingers_under]

I would take the one bedded. He has a wider curl which is probably why he's not completely broomed (his right horn appears a bit shorter). I have personally witnessed rams grinding their horn tips on boulders. When/if their horns obscure their vision, they broom them. If you look at the ram on the left, his broomed horns end right at his line of sight. The arc on the bedded ram's horns drop well below his eye. The left ram may score better now because of more relative mass due to his brooming but the bedded ram will be a 200 class sheep if he lives another 3 or 4 years.

BTW Alaska regs define a full curl ram as any ram with two broomed horns, 8 or more growth rings(annuili) or if at least one of the horns makes a completed circle when viewed from profile. Its a VERY subjective judgement to have to make under field conditions BUT woe be unto he who shoots a too small ram.

 

[Bear Creek Adventures]

Desert Sheep,

Great story!! I can hardly wait until I draw a sheep tag. We have some great sheep here in NM, if you can you ought to apply. Thanks for sharing the story.