dcoryn
Well-known member
My hunting partner and I had been thinking about cashing in on our sheep points and doing this hunt for a couple seasons and finally decided to go for it this spring. We hemmed and hawed on what unit to apply for and finally after talking to a few biologists we decided on one of the 680 units. My hunting partner both applied as non-residents and another friend of ours applied as a resident. Myself and the other non-resident were successful but our resident friend was unsuccessful. We had lucked out and drawn 2 of the 4 non-resident tags for our unit. We were going to be sheep hunting!!
Fast forward through a summer of e-scouting and access issues, and I am picking up my buddy last Friday at the airport at 9:30 pm. Our plan was to get a good nights rest and head towards our sheep area in the morning to meet our other buddy that had not drawn but decided to come along as a pack mule. We ended up meeting where the paved road meets the gravel and headed straight into the breaks around 1 pm. After a couple hours on gravel and two-tracks we reached the end of our truck accessible route and got our gear ready to head out.
There was a group of cowboys ranchers at the end of the road that had been down in the breaks working cattle all day. We stopped and chatted with them and they emphatically told us we were nuts! They said they had covered most of that country east of where we wanted to hunt and hadn't seen a single sheep. We were a little disheartened but took off down into the drainage anyways. With camp on our back we were fully loaded and the hills were steep. We made it about 3.2 miles before it started to rain a little bit and we decided to make camp. Once we got our tents setup we took shelter in our tents and tried to scan the drainage's across the river. Within a few minutes we had 10-12 rams spotted and felt a little better about our situation.
Unfortunately the rain kept up and didn't quit until about 930 am the next day. Once it started to slack off we got our packs loaded up and headed towards the west. We slowly checked each of the drainage's we came across hoping that eventually we would spot a few sheep, but as the day drug on we hadn't spotted a single sheep besides the rams from the previous day again. We kept on hiking and checking but we had reached a point that we needed to turn back around and head back to camp to try and hunt our way back there.
We were down to our final drainage that we planned on checking and as we peered into it from the river we spotted what looked to be three ewes before they fed out of sight. We didn't hesitate and took off stalking quickly up the dry drainage to close the distance. About 1/3 of the way up the cut we jumped two mule deer bucks that also ran straight up the dry creek bed. We hoped they wouldn't blow the sheep up and kept on moving trying to cut the distance. Pretty quickly we were at the bottom of the hillside the sheep had been on and we were slowly stalking our way around to the back of it to see if the sheep had found a fold in the hill to feed in. About 100 yards into creeping up the secondary drainage I spotted one of the ewes. I had my friend get setup on her while I slowly moved a little further up to see if I could spot another ewe.
As he was settling in for his shot I located another ewe, I decided we should try for a double and told him to go ahead and shoot first and I would follow up as quick as I could. The sheep were only 160-180 yards away from us but it was a very steep vertical angle. I felt settled and was waiting what seemed like forever for his shot to ring out but was probably more like 5 seconds. BOOM! He shot and without even thinking about it I squeezed my trigger. My ewe immediately reared up and went down hard, my friends quickly walked out of his view but I could see she was getting wobbly as she was working back into the fold. Within seconds his ewe came tumbling down into the bottom. As we were walking up to check his out mine had come loose form its hold and tumbled all the way to the bottom also.
We were in disbelief, within 15 minutes our hunt had gone from discouraging to over. I had been dreaming about doubling up in a situation just like this ever since we drew our tags. We took about 15 minutes and just sat with the sheep enjoying what might be the only bighorn sheep hunt we ever get to go on. After taking in the moment the reality of the situation hit pretty quickly. It was a hot afternoon and we had two sheep on the ground about 8 miles from camp that was another 3 miles from the truck. We got to work breaking them down and started heading back. After a long dry strenuous hike we made it into camp at about 11:20 pm. We hunt our meat bags on a fence line to cool off, cooked up a mountain house meal and crashed hard.
The next morning we struggled to get moving and get our feet under us again. We packed up a heavy load and started making our way back towards the truck. It was a slow hike that had a ton of elevation gain and was absolutely kicking our butts. Even worse was knowing we were going to have to head back down the hill as soon as we had the meat back to the truck and in the cooler. At about 12:30 we made it to the truck with the first load and we were whooped. I suggested that we should run the 10 miles or so back to where the cowboys had a cow camp set up that we had driven by on our way in to see if they were still around. As we pulled up all of their vehicles were there along with a four wheeler and side by side. I knocked on the camper door hoping for an answer but no such luck.
Dejected we got back in the truck to head back down for a second load. I remembered one of the cowgirls names though and decided to see if I could find her on facebook while we had service and get a message to her that we wanted to borrow a four wheeler quick. I told her we would give her a little cash and fill it up with fuel. Miraculously she got right back to me with the number of the family that ran the cow camp. I called them and they said to go right ahead and use the machines as long as they were back by the time they were returning to cow camp. We were thrilled as there was a two-track that took us all the way back to camp (it was just too rough for a pickup with all the washouts). I finally felt like we could relax a little bit and we headed back with the machines to pick up the last load.
We loaded up the trucks, filled up our borrowed machines with fuel, stashed a little cash in the glove box and hit the road headed home.
For as short as the hunt was it was as tiring as any I've been on. I had underestimated the terrain in the breaks, as well as the temperature, and the amount of water we needed to sustain our level of activity...
Heres a few pictures:
Fast forward through a summer of e-scouting and access issues, and I am picking up my buddy last Friday at the airport at 9:30 pm. Our plan was to get a good nights rest and head towards our sheep area in the morning to meet our other buddy that had not drawn but decided to come along as a pack mule. We ended up meeting where the paved road meets the gravel and headed straight into the breaks around 1 pm. After a couple hours on gravel and two-tracks we reached the end of our truck accessible route and got our gear ready to head out.
There was a group of cowboys ranchers at the end of the road that had been down in the breaks working cattle all day. We stopped and chatted with them and they emphatically told us we were nuts! They said they had covered most of that country east of where we wanted to hunt and hadn't seen a single sheep. We were a little disheartened but took off down into the drainage anyways. With camp on our back we were fully loaded and the hills were steep. We made it about 3.2 miles before it started to rain a little bit and we decided to make camp. Once we got our tents setup we took shelter in our tents and tried to scan the drainage's across the river. Within a few minutes we had 10-12 rams spotted and felt a little better about our situation.
Unfortunately the rain kept up and didn't quit until about 930 am the next day. Once it started to slack off we got our packs loaded up and headed towards the west. We slowly checked each of the drainage's we came across hoping that eventually we would spot a few sheep, but as the day drug on we hadn't spotted a single sheep besides the rams from the previous day again. We kept on hiking and checking but we had reached a point that we needed to turn back around and head back to camp to try and hunt our way back there.
We were down to our final drainage that we planned on checking and as we peered into it from the river we spotted what looked to be three ewes before they fed out of sight. We didn't hesitate and took off stalking quickly up the dry drainage to close the distance. About 1/3 of the way up the cut we jumped two mule deer bucks that also ran straight up the dry creek bed. We hoped they wouldn't blow the sheep up and kept on moving trying to cut the distance. Pretty quickly we were at the bottom of the hillside the sheep had been on and we were slowly stalking our way around to the back of it to see if the sheep had found a fold in the hill to feed in. About 100 yards into creeping up the secondary drainage I spotted one of the ewes. I had my friend get setup on her while I slowly moved a little further up to see if I could spot another ewe.
As he was settling in for his shot I located another ewe, I decided we should try for a double and told him to go ahead and shoot first and I would follow up as quick as I could. The sheep were only 160-180 yards away from us but it was a very steep vertical angle. I felt settled and was waiting what seemed like forever for his shot to ring out but was probably more like 5 seconds. BOOM! He shot and without even thinking about it I squeezed my trigger. My ewe immediately reared up and went down hard, my friends quickly walked out of his view but I could see she was getting wobbly as she was working back into the fold. Within seconds his ewe came tumbling down into the bottom. As we were walking up to check his out mine had come loose form its hold and tumbled all the way to the bottom also.
We were in disbelief, within 15 minutes our hunt had gone from discouraging to over. I had been dreaming about doubling up in a situation just like this ever since we drew our tags. We took about 15 minutes and just sat with the sheep enjoying what might be the only bighorn sheep hunt we ever get to go on. After taking in the moment the reality of the situation hit pretty quickly. It was a hot afternoon and we had two sheep on the ground about 8 miles from camp that was another 3 miles from the truck. We got to work breaking them down and started heading back. After a long dry strenuous hike we made it into camp at about 11:20 pm. We hunt our meat bags on a fence line to cool off, cooked up a mountain house meal and crashed hard.
The next morning we struggled to get moving and get our feet under us again. We packed up a heavy load and started making our way back towards the truck. It was a slow hike that had a ton of elevation gain and was absolutely kicking our butts. Even worse was knowing we were going to have to head back down the hill as soon as we had the meat back to the truck and in the cooler. At about 12:30 we made it to the truck with the first load and we were whooped. I suggested that we should run the 10 miles or so back to where the cowboys had a cow camp set up that we had driven by on our way in to see if they were still around. As we pulled up all of their vehicles were there along with a four wheeler and side by side. I knocked on the camper door hoping for an answer but no such luck.
Dejected we got back in the truck to head back down for a second load. I remembered one of the cowgirls names though and decided to see if I could find her on facebook while we had service and get a message to her that we wanted to borrow a four wheeler quick. I told her we would give her a little cash and fill it up with fuel. Miraculously she got right back to me with the number of the family that ran the cow camp. I called them and they said to go right ahead and use the machines as long as they were back by the time they were returning to cow camp. We were thrilled as there was a two-track that took us all the way back to camp (it was just too rough for a pickup with all the washouts). I finally felt like we could relax a little bit and we headed back with the machines to pick up the last load.
We loaded up the trucks, filled up our borrowed machines with fuel, stashed a little cash in the glove box and hit the road headed home.
For as short as the hunt was it was as tiring as any I've been on. I had underestimated the terrain in the breaks, as well as the temperature, and the amount of water we needed to sustain our level of activity...
Heres a few pictures:
!!
