Hawaii hunt planning
- Thread starter brownbear932008
- Start date
brownbear932008
Well-known member
It appears they have glass eye. Kinda stinks but still worth the price I guess. The bow or muzzy price isn't to bad.
glass eye
Well-known member
brownbear932008
Well-known member
Wow that is a large jump. Gonna keep a few people away and with the number of animals they have there not a good thing.
alwayshunting
Active member
My mouflon hunt is only one week away. I have started laying out my gear and will be taking the muzzleloader out for practice one last time tomorrow. I fly out to Maui on Wednesday. I have seen a few reports from the archery season that the numbers are down which make me a little nervous. I still need to find somewhere on Lani, or possibly Maui, to shoot my muzzleloader to make sure nothing got knocked off during the flights. I plan to take the ferry over to Lanai on Friday and get a half day of scouting before the short season opens. I have been looking at maps trying to determine which roads/trails will be accessible. I have also spoke with the Hawaii DLNR and received some suggestions of where to locate the sheep. If anyone that has hunted the island be and has any suggestion on hunting mouflon I would definitely appreciate a PM. I look forward to getting my feet on the ground and figure out how to hunt a new animal in a totally new environment.
brownbear932008
Well-known member
Good luck to you alwayshunting. I can't wait to see how you do over there. I still have a while to wait it out. Hopefully the numbers are good and you do well.
Very interested in the info in this thread. I'm a new Hawaii resident on Oahu for the next few years. I want to hunt all Hawaii has to offer! Hopefully get a Lanai axis deer and mouflon sheep tag for next year. for those who have hunted Lanai, does anyone have a good contact for a good taxidermist on the island? Also, getting the meat from lanai back to oahu. Tips? Just check a cooler with the airlines and pay the overweight fee?
alwayshunting
Active member
Not so sure how live of a hunt thread it will be as I usually try to put away the phone while out hunting, but I will definitely be posting a followup report with pictures when I am done.
Art Vandeley
Well-known member
How'd the hunt go alwayshunting? Has anyone hunted Kauai for pigs? Might try a guided day archery pig hunt. Looks like family vacation is set for March there.
alwayshunting
Active member
I did a short write up on my hunt over here: https://onyourownadventures.com/hunttalk/showthread.php?277687-Lanai-Mouflon-Sheep-Hunt
I am looking forward to hear from a few others who have posted on this thread and are hunting over there during the rifle season. It was a unique experience that has me wanting to go back again.
I drew a Mouflon rifle tag but decided not to hunt. If possible, I drew too many out of state hunts this year against the amount of vacation time. I had to choose between HI Mouflon or a late December AZ Coues rifle hunt. I’m going to AZ!
What a "problem" to have! I think I'd have made the same choice you did. Good luck in AZ!
brownbear932008
Well-known member
Sorry guys life and hunting season and PC issues have slowed my story down on this end. I have had it typed up for a week and then had issues getting in here on the laptop.
Well I have finally some what caught up around the house and settled back into every day life after almost three weeks of travel and hunting. First off I can't thank a few people on this forum enough for helping me plan my hunt in Hawaii a little better than I could have all by myself. Breck and Nathan you guys are great and helped so much. That is what makes HT the best forum online IMO.
I learned a lot and there are a few things I would do different on the next trip that would have made things better. The island of Lanai is a really cool place and I really enjoyed my week there. That place is just amazing lots of game and it is really a laid back type of place. Very small community with some nice people. I mainly laid on the beach with the wife while there. My actual hunt consisted of 3 hours the first morning of the state sheep season. But I did manage to sneak away from the beach two days and scout some areas on the private side. I have some nice little honey holes for sheep and deer for the next trip.
The mouflon sheep are a pretty cool little sheep and they live in some pretty tough country. I don't know if they normally hang in the rough gulches on the island or if they where pushed into the areas with it being later in the sheep season. I hunted the next to the last weekend of the state season. I think weekend 8 of 9 weekends of sheep shooting. The kill on the state side was around the 700 mark half ewes and half rams and that was up until week 6. So they had three more weekends of shooting animals. So there are a lot of sheep to say the least. I would say it will hit 1000 by the end of the sheep season. I don't know what the norm is but that is a lot of animals.
Well I have finally some what caught up around the house and settled back into every day life after almost three weeks of travel and hunting. First off I can't thank a few people on this forum enough for helping me plan my hunt in Hawaii a little better than I could have all by myself. Breck and Nathan you guys are great and helped so much. That is what makes HT the best forum online IMO.
I learned a lot and there are a few things I would do different on the next trip that would have made things better. The island of Lanai is a really cool place and I really enjoyed my week there. That place is just amazing lots of game and it is really a laid back type of place. Very small community with some nice people. I mainly laid on the beach with the wife while there. My actual hunt consisted of 3 hours the first morning of the state sheep season. But I did manage to sneak away from the beach two days and scout some areas on the private side. I have some nice little honey holes for sheep and deer for the next trip.
The mouflon sheep are a pretty cool little sheep and they live in some pretty tough country. I don't know if they normally hang in the rough gulches on the island or if they where pushed into the areas with it being later in the sheep season. I hunted the next to the last weekend of the state season. I think weekend 8 of 9 weekends of sheep shooting. The kill on the state side was around the 700 mark half ewes and half rams and that was up until week 6. So they had three more weekends of shooting animals. So there are a lot of sheep to say the least. I would say it will hit 1000 by the end of the sheep season. I don't know what the norm is but that is a lot of animals.
brownbear932008
Well-known member
I went out Friday evening before my hunt and checked a few areas I had done sat recon on prior to my trip. I thought the areas looked good and settled on my first area to start my morning off on Saturday morning. The gulches were way more rugged than I had imagined they would be. I was thinking this may be closer to a mountain goat hunt in the west minus the high elevation and miles of walking that needed to he done. That was lesson one a man does not have to park at the top of the gulch like I did only to hike two miles down the gulch with a road basically running along the rim of the gulch. And then shoot a ram a half mile from the end of the road on down the gulch to hike and pack the sheep back to the truck all up hill. I do admitt I dropped the pack of meat when I hit the road and only packed the sheep a half mile but it was a tough half mile I must say. I don't know if it was the heat or what that made it so tough but I was drained. Maybe it was all the up and down in the gulches I hiked prior to shooting the ram also.
brownbear932008
Well-known member
But as far as the hunt and finding animals it was pretty easy. I began at the top of the gulch on Saturday at daylight and began working my way toward the sea. I was beginning to jump animals from the bottom of the gulch and began to see a pattern. These sheep where extremely cautious I don't think I saw a one that hadn't spotted me first. After seeing 15 or so sheep and passing on a few medium sized rams and pollies I had sit down for a little break to watch some country and rest a bit around 9am. After a little break I began to move around a point where two gulches came together and formed one large gulch. As soon as I rounded the point to glass back up the gulch towards the vehicle I see sheep and they are on the run. I first spot a ewe leading the pack with a pollie ram. Then about ten or so sheep come into view all ewes until I look at the last sheep and he was a nice ram. I decided very quickly he was a shooter to me and that I would be very happy to take him. All the sheep were on the move running up toward the top of the rim of the gulch in an attempt to go over the top and out of danger. The ram finally stopped at 140 yards and I let the man bun round eat and blew out the rams heart. He made it about 20 yards after the shot and fell into the rocks. I began to make my way over to him and got onto a ledge on the cliff I couldn't seem to find a way down through. After accessing the problem I decided if I could make it to the ledge below me I could make it into the bottom to climb the other side of the gulch to the sheep. I decided my only shot short of climbing back up and out and trying to find another route was to jump about 6 feet off the ledge and head on down. So that's what I did. Lesson two don't jump onto such ledges with a full back pack and all your gear. I'm way to old for that now days. But it worked out and I was fine and finally made it over to him to begin the quartering process. Now does anyone know any good mouflon recipes I haven't tried it yet. I have heard both good and bad things about the meat but hopefully can try it soon.
Last edited:
glass eye
Well-known member
Congrats
brownbear932008
Well-known member
Thanks glass eye. I now realize that ram you full body mounted is a really great ram. Now I wanna go back and chase those deer.
Last edited:
