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Desert Bighorn - Pic Heavy

I just got home and am exhausted, plus I need to get up early to meet the biologist with the rams nasal swab and to get the horns plugged... so I'll get better pics up soon. But here's a teaser. It was a great hunt, tougher than I expected, but excellent!

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Here he is two days before the hunt opened while we were scouting

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Been wondering about your hunt. Looks like you got a nice ram—Congratulations! Looking forward to the story.
 
That looks like a hell of a ram. Congrats! (Of course, until you get the story up, I'll just have to assume it's just a shed that you found somewhere...)
 
We've pretty much covered the run-up where my wife and I spent three trips over the last month scouting and learning the unit so I'll just start with the last few days.

Andrea and I went down to the area the Wednesday before the Saturday opener hoping to maybe find a shooter ram before game time. She's due with our first child in November so sadly couldn't join on much of the actual hunt but came for moral support and to just be in camp anyway.

It really felt serious though on Thursday morning when Aaron Bronson and I started our hike into a back corner of the unit looking for something special. The terrain is intimidating and the idea of finding a ram there is even worse

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A few we decided to pass on

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After about 8 hours covering the canyons we could access from that spot, we hiked back to the road and went to an area that Andrea and I had seen a good ram in about 10 days before (post #29). We didn't find that ram, but found something better. This was the first time we laid eyes on my ram.

Friday was a repeat of the prior day, just in a different area for the morning, and then watching my ram again in the afternoon where we got to see him chase ewes and run off other rams. It was a great experience to get a little connection that way. These are all of my ram from those two days watching him.

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We went to bed that night not knowing what would happen the next morning when the hunt actually started but we knew we'd be in our spot.

The ram had moved up the cliffs and was inaccessible so we were forced to wait in the sun for about 6 hours before starting the stalk and it took another two hours before we popped over the cliff face and were face to face with the ram at 147yds. After that, we were able to bring him home for good!

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I owe a special thanks to all my new friends that I met down there who were so excited and supportive with their help! Sheep hunting really brings out the best in people!

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Freakin awesome. Congratulations—on an amazing ram and on your upcoming plunge into fatherhood.
 
To someone who might not understand, they might think that this opening day ram was an easy hunt, a walk in the park. Obviously the effort is front loaded with catching lightning (drawing the tag) followed by research, scouting, more scouting, learning the whereabouts and habits, and then finally last and almost least, sending the bullet.

Thanks for sharing your adventure with us. Congratulations
 

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