...I SHOULD HAVE DONE A SEARCH BEFORE POSTING. MY ERROR , THIS HAS BEEN DISCUSSED ALREADY IN THE PAST, PLEASE DISREGARD
Inactive threads can quickly become buried, and often buried very deep in these Forums. These Forums are also constantly getting new members, and other members, like myself, don't access the Forums every day, or we don't read all of the threads.
I'll also often see an old thread that someone brings up, and almost immediately someone will post something like "This thread is XX years old, why didn't you start a new one?" So the result is a new poster is damned if he starts a new duplicate thread or damned if he re-opens an old thread. Personally I don't have any problem with someone bringing up an old thread or if they start a new one. Even if I contributed to an old thread XX years ago I've probably forgotten what I posted back then, and very often there will be a lot of new posts to it.
So with this new NA-29 thread, I'm in the group of hunters that would like to hunt all of the NA-29 animals but never will, mainly because of the cost. I've seen Desert Sheep hunts that cost more than what I paid for my house! And like others have posted, there are many multiple species international hunts that cost less than many single species North American hunts. I guess it's all a matter of priorities.
I have a friend that I met on my Quebec Caribou hunt who recently completed his NA-29. He also recently posted a picture of his beautiful Polar Bear mount that because of politics he most likely never will be able to bring it home.
I didn't start big game hunting until I was in college, and I shot my first mule deer in 1965 and my first elk in 1966 on DIY hunts in NW Colorado with one of my college roommates. Before I moved to Montana in 1975 I also shot my first Pronghorn antelope and first Black bear also on DIY hunts near my home in NW Colorado. My first fall in Montana I killed my first Whitetail buck.
I've shot 17 of the NA-29 animals, and I am still hoping to add several more. I am lucky enough to have lived and hunted in Montana when our "big 3", Bighorn sheep, Shiras moose, and Mountain goat only cost me a $25 resident tag and a tank of gas for my truck. I was able to shoot 3 Bighorn rams, 2 Shiras bull moose and a Billy Mtn goat all on DIY hunts within 100 miles of my home.
I shot my first Caribou back in 1980 when four of my friends and I went on a DIY hunt in Alaska. I shot my second Caribou species, a Mountain Caribou, and my Dall ram on my first guided hunt which was in 1999 in the Mackenzie Mountains in Canada's Northwest Territories. I went farther north in Canada to Inuvik, NWT for a couple of Central Canadian Barren Ground Caribou and a Musk ox. I had been wanting to hunt Caribou in Quebec for many years, and finally in 2017, the last year Quebec was open for non-resident caribou hunting, I booked a hunt there and my first day hunting, I shot one of the highest B&C scoring caribou from that Province in 3 years. Lucky, lucky, lucky!
Last year I booked a hunt in Newfoundland for my 5th Caribou species and for an Eastern Canada Moose. We hunted hard for 6 days and didn't see any caribou, and although we saw 4 shootable bull moose, none had antlers as large as my Shiras moose, so I passed on them. That was the first guided hunt that I have been on where I didn't fire a shot. So much for Trophy hunting!
I had been buying a Mountain lion tag almost ever year for over 40 years, mainly hoping to come across a lion while hunting deer or elk. I've actually seen 3 lions within a quarter mile of my house, but never when I could have shot one. Then in 2015 I saw an ad from a new lion outfitter is western Colorado so I booked a hunt with him, and the first day out he and his dogs put me on a great tom lion. I hadn't really thought about it much, but that lion completed the Grand Slam Club Ovis's requirements for their Super Ten.
Also in 2004 I shot a Buffalo in Southwestern Montana, and last December I hunted Alaska's Kodiak Island for a Sitka Blacktail buck.
Last winter I was looking at several other hunts, but luckily I didn't book one as covid has closed so many borders. Hopefully next year will be better!
