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[mtnkid85]

Just curious @mtnkid85 how many seasons have you done the unlimited hunts?

Ive only hunted for myself in the unlimited two years. I was successful in 2012 in 501 and just started hunting them again this year.

Ive "hunted" in 500 & 501 with my brother during most of the 8 years between my own hunts. And I spend considerable time in 500,501 and 300 during the rest of big game season.

About the only 1 of the 5 districts where I could see a 24 hr closure is even practical or needed maybe and its a maybe. Is 303 Gardiner area. One major weather event and the stars line up just right a guy could have a real mess on his hands if some sheep got caught out of the park.

I could see a Spanish Peaks massacre happening there for sure..... hasn't happened yet though.

Let me ask you this.......... What happens if your hunting with a buddy who has a tag as well. There's one on the quota in your district, you guys come across 2 tanker rams, I mean full blown double broomed, 10 year old rams. The rams are in a good area for packout, you've been grinding for 20 days for a sheep, this is the moment.

Do you shoot both rams?

The answer is........... #*^@#* yes you do. Flick that safety and count to 3......

If you say no, then your lying to yourself if it doesn't cross your mind.

Of course Ive considered something along this idea. You're absolutely right I would have a difficult time not taking that shot. I will say that when the quota was updated as filled on Day 2 of the season this year I packed out and went elk hunting.
And I had been "on" rams. I had found a band with at least two legal rams that I watched for the two days prior to the opener, I never could turn them up during the two days of the season though. Im quite certain those two rams where harvested.

Because those two rams harvested are of age, caliber, them being harvested isn't going to have an effect on the population one bit. They actually stand just of good of chance not making it that winter if they are 10 plus.

More rams die of age, winter, predation, natural causes than anything else. Not hunter harvest.

I guess all this boils down to is if we are ok harvesting more animals than what the quota is set for or not. If the current quotas are being set while keeping a "cushion" for animals harvested after the quota then why not just up the quota and end the season sooner?

 

[EYJONAS!]

Congrats on the ram, that's pretty awesome. Maybe share a little peek eh? I guess if you put it in a conscience deal of packing up and rolling when it is in closure that is your decision. It would definitely be a tough one especially in your situation last year.

So to answer that it's in the body and mind of the hunter at the time.

In talking to numerous old school unlimited freaks. The answer a guy usually hears is don't go changing something that works and stir the pot.

I remember a story of Jack killing 4 one morning in the 80s or something.

Now if we have a significant die off then that's a whole other world.

I appreciate you joining the conversation on here about the hunt. It's cool to see everyone's adventures and stories. Something that I think is the best part about the hunt itself.

 

[EYJONAS!]

One of the points I was making was. I don't see the difference between killing 2 rams with 1 on the quota already or shutting it down in 24 hrs.

I think the 2020 6th ram deal is just what it sounds like. 2020 in general, weird, whacky, shit.

I sure hope it don't happen again but never know

 

[BigHornRam]

Had a young ram bolt in front of me on an icy hwy 200 this morning. He won't live long if he keeps that up.

 

[recurveman]

I think when the hunters kill that many rams in that short a period of time it shows that the quota system is working. If I'm not mistaken the quota a few years ago was 3 rams for unit 501. In 2015 only one ram was killed, in 2016 only 2 rams were killed and no rams were killed in 2017 due to the snow before the season. That is 6 rams that were legal to take that were not harvested. Doesn't surprise me that this happened. SO, It looks to me that the heard is doing really well and maybe they could consider moving the quota back up to 3 rams. My guess is that they will look at how the next season or two go and make a decision then.

If the season isn't over then keep hunting. Until the overweight chick sings I'm going to be hunting.

 

[shines@times]

Until the overweight chick sings I'm going to be hunting.

Damn it! If you insist on PC pandering, then please, no half-measures. "Chick" is no more politically correct than is "fat." Better yet, let's agree to dump PC entirely!

(Just kidding of course. I found the sentence quite entertaining.)

 

[shines@times]

Laws are laws but ethics are personal.

Well stated!

 

[recurveman]

Damn it! If you insist on PC pandering, then please, no half-measures. "Chick" is no more politically correct than is "fat." Better yet, let's agree to dump PC entirely!

(Just kidding of course. I found the sentence quite entertaining.)

Oh it wasn't for PC reasons. Just pure entertainment value. I'm the least PC person you will ever meet. At work (I own a company) they call me the HR nightmare!!!!!

 

[shines@times]

Oh it wasn't for PC reasons. Just pure entertainment value. I'm the least PC person you will ever meet. At work (I own a company) they call me the HR nightmare!!!!!

I took it thusly.

While we are generally a considerate and polite group here (are you listening EYEJONAS?), I'd be surprised to learn that political correctness is a good fit for many of our number.

 

[EYJONAS!]

Hey I'm more than polite and inviting. I just don't like to poke the sleeping bear....

 

[buffybr]

I started hunting Unlimited sheep in 1978. A lot has changed since then. Back then the sheep tags were $25 and over the counter. You could apply for a draw unit and if you didn't draw you could buy an Unlimited tag. There was no 7 year wait if you were successful in killing a ram. There were more units, and the sheep season would open in early September and if the quotas weren't filled, the season wouldn't close until the last Sunday of November.

We didn't know just how good we had it back then. I bought a tag just about every year for almost 15 years. I also didn't take it as seriously as I should have. I would usually go in the opening weekend, and if I didn't find a ram, oh well, I'll try again the next year.

There also weren't as many people hunting sheep back then as there are now. Many years I would not see another hunter the whole time I was in there.

In 1978 I drew a goat tag in the unit north of Quake Lake. Back then that area was also Unlimited sheep unit 302, so I bought a sheep tag there. I started scouting there for goats in August and continued through September and October, but because I wanted a goat with long hair, I left my goat tag home until November. The whole time that I was scouting for goats, but with the sheep tag in my pocket, I only saw one other sheep hunter in there, and he was a local from West Yellowstone in for a day hunt.

My second Unlimited tag was in Unit 303 east of Gardiner. I backpacked by myself into the Hellroaring drainage in the A-B Wilderness. The early elk rifle season was also open in that area. I didn't see any sheep, but I was seeing elk every day, and shortly after I had left my camp on the third morning a heavy dark antlered with white tips 6x6 came walking through the scattered timber toward me. He stopped broadside about 75 yards from me and bugled and a 117 grain Sierra from my .257 AI ended both my elk and sheep hunting for that year. I only saw one other person in there on that trip, and he was a guy from Gardiner who had an elk camp higher up the drainage.

In the early '80s I think there were three other years that I had Unlimited sheep tags in Unit 302. I horse packed a camp into that unit for opening day of those years, and each year I only saw one other camp in there. The first year one of the guys in the other camp killed a ram, and I also killed one.

The second year I hunted a different part of the unit and I got within 20 yards of two legal rams, but they were smaller that the ram that I had shot the year before, so I didn't shoot one. A hunter from the outfitted camp that was in there gut shot one of those rams then lost it, and I ended up killing it for her.

The third year that I went into 302 I shot the ram that I had passed up the year before, and I think that was the last year that 302 was unlimited.

The last year that I hunted any of the Unlimited units was also the last year that you could make the Unlimited tag your second choice in the drawing and be given that tag if you were unsuccessful on your first choice. That was in the late '90s and I went into unit 300. A friend of mine had killed a good ram in there the previous year and he told me his secret spot.

I saw a great full curl broomed ram not 50 yards in the timber below me the day before the season opened, but when the sun came up the next morning that valley was full of guided hunters on horseback, 5 or 6 tents in the meadow across from me, and orange pumpkins scattered all around the valley. Then there a group of hikers that had climbed the back side of the peak at the head of the valley and they were yelling that they made it. The local game warden was also riding on horseback through there as was a Yellowstone NP pack string that was bringing supplies to the park rangers in full camo that were watching to make sure no hunters crossed the line into the park. Not my idea of wilderness hunting.

As for the unit ram quotas, some years they fill them, some years they don't. Some years they might go over. It pretty much evens out over a period of years. Much of the Unlimited unit country is very remote. There is absolutely NO cell phone service. Even with horses, it took me a full 48 hours to get my camps out and to get two of my rams to the FWP headquarters in Bozeman. Its not like hunting in the back 40 back east.

Sheep hunting gets more popular every year. Enjoy these Unlimited units while you can.

 

[EYJONAS!]

That's a blessed and amazing unlimited career there!

 

[buffybr]

That's a blessed and amazing unlimited career there!

Yes, I've had a very blessed and amazing hunting career!

And hopefully I'm not done yet!

 

[Irrelevant]

We didn't know just how good we had it back then.

I fear history is doomed to repeat itself, and we'll all be saying the same things in the future.

 

[recurveman]

For us hunters just starting the unlimited hunts...........we just hope that the number of sheep we see exceeds the number of grizzly bears we see.

 

[mtnkid85]

For us hunters just starting the unlimited hunts...........we just hope that the number of sheep we see exceeds the number of grizzly bears we see.

Id be astatic if I could see that many sheep on a unlimited sheep hunt! Ha.

Congrats on the ram, that's pretty awesome. Maybe share a little peek eh? I guess if you put it in a conscience deal of packing up and rolling when it is in closure that is your decision. It would definitely be a tough one especially in your situation last year.

So to answer that it's in the body and mind of the hunter at the time.

In talking to numerous old school unlimited freaks. The answer a guy usually hears is don't go changing something that works and stir the pot.

I remember a story of Jack killing 4 one morning in the 80s or something.

Now if we have a significant die off then that's a whole other world.

I appreciate you joining the conversation on here about the hunt. It's cool to see everyone's adventures and stories. Something that I think is the best part about the hunt itself.

Ive been lurking on the this thread since the beginning, i think Ive even posted in here a time or two. I just don't post much about my favorite mountain range.

We can agree on all accounts the unlimited sheep hunts are a special deal we should all be proud of and all want to see endure, ethics are a personal choice and 2020 is weird, wacky, shit.

I grew up climbing in the beartooth's with mentors who preached ethics and preserving the mystique of the range. As the saying gos "The first rule of Beartooth's club is don't talk about Beartooth's club"... or something like that. lol

I used to say that I was really familiar with the range, that is until I started hunting in it. There are alot of folds and rolls for sheep to grow old and die in. More than Ill be able to see in this lifetime.

 

[shines@times]

I fear history is doomed to repeat itself, and we'll all be saying the same things in the future.

No doubt about that as long as human population growth goes on unchecked. That is, until the population crashes--after all, we are animals who, like all others, require resources that are not unlimited on our blue marble. That's a big part of why I chose the Heinlein quotation as my tagline.

 

[shines@times]

For us hunters just starting the unlimited hunts...........we just hope that the number of sheep we see exceeds the number of grizzly bears we see.

Believe it or not, at the time that I first learned about the unlimited sheep districts, there was actually an unlimited Grizzly Bear unit as well. If I recall correctly, it was wholely within the Bob Marshall wilderness with a quota of either one or two bear(s). If the grizzly bears are doing so well in the Absaroka Beartooth, perhaps it is time for the state to reexamine that management strategy for possible application to the "Tooths."

In my opinion, it is preferable to keep the bears leery of humans by an occasional sportsman shooting one of their number. Preferable, that is, to habituating the bears to humans as a source of food, and nothing to fear, with the eventual and inevitable result that problem bears will have to be "euthenized" by FWP or National Park staff. And, since bears can't be trusted to distinguish hackysack-playing Green Party members from innocent hunters, much preferable to the bears taking an ocassional human for brunch.

 

[Irrelevant]

No doubt about that as long as human population growth goes on unchecked. That is, until the population crashes--after all, we are animals who, like all others, require resources that are not unlimited on our blue marble. That's a big part of why I chose the Heinlein quotation as my tagline.

Similar reasoning with mine.

 

[buffybr]

Believe it or not, at the time that I first learned about the unlimited sheep districts, there was actually an unlimited Grizzly Bear unit as well. If I recall correctly, it was wholely within the Bob Marshall wilderness ...

I moved to Montana in 1975, and at that time grizzly tags were unlimited, over the counter, and cost $25. I lived north of Kalispell then and the Whitefish mountain range up there was open to grizzly hunting.

I used to buy a tag every year just hoping to find a bear on the gut pile of my elk. Just like the unlimited sheep tags back then, I didn't know how good a deal that was and I didn't take full advantage of it.

Talking to my friends that grew up in Bozeman, they said that the grizzly tags back than were good in this area also. Towns like West Yellowstone and Cooke City had open dumps and people would go there in the evenings to watch the bears. First the black bears would come in and then just before dark they would act nervous and leave, than the grizzlies would come in. Nobody thought about shooting one, however I've heard rumors that one of the more popular posters on this Forum got his grizzly that way.