So, we're going to be Sheep hunters....

[Bluffgruff]

All these outfitters trying to chip away at your DIY resolve...

 

[imoldham]

Congrats friend! My wife drew this year as well! Its like a dream come true with a touch of nightmare as it is 9 weeks after she gives birth to our 4th child!!!!! But she is no ordinary woman to say the least!

 

[DKidaho]

Congrats. Good Luck.

 

[NoKidsAfter40]

I have a simple perspective when it comes to applying for tags. You can’t win if you don’t play. I don’t gamble for money, smoke or drink, but am a geek when it comes to odds and know that there are no worse odds than 0 in anything. I'm also a sucker for raffles.

Like Randy preaches, we have developed strategic short term, midterm, long term and BIG DREAM plans. This strategy has served us quite well and my wife and I have been very fortunate to pull some sweet tags over the last few years. However, this year has been full of unfathomable gifts from the man upstairs.

Lightning struck back in February when Alicia pulled a Muskox tag for Nunivak Island, AK January 2022. That hunt and those tags aren’t inexpensive by any means, but we budget well and have a mutual understanding that we can make any “big dream” tags work by cutting other life expenses. We hunt DIY, so that takes a lot of financial burden out of the equation, though there is never a convenient time to drop several thousands of dollars.

At the top of the list of dream hunts since Alicia and I both began hunting together in college has always been a Sheep hunt. It checks all the boxes of a true adventure and such an exclusive club to be a part of. We’ll never win the preference point race and I just can’t ever imagine a circumstance where we’d spend the amount necessary to guarantee an opportunity or hunt one (guided) in some states.

Introduce, New Mexico. Our true “Big Dream” state where we swing for the fences every year because everyone has an equal chance (well, kind of). Everything we apply for in New Mexico is a home run or strike out scenario. Having drawn a premium Elk tag there in the past, I am willing to sacrifice years of disappointment for the opportunity at high quality on a budget.

This morning, lightning struck the same spot a second time this year as I opened our results to find a bar of green below a giant stack of red, try again next years. My first reaction was downright panic. I figured I must have made a mistake, much like I had just done in Arizona by applying for (and drawing) a cow elk tag instead of bull. This would be a COSTLY mistake and it took me twenty minutes to confirm what my eyes were telling me.

After all of my frantic search for confirmation, I was finally able to come to peace with the fact that Alicia had draw a Rocky Mountain Bighorn Sheep tag in New Mexico! In fact, as best that I can tell, she drew the only non-resident/unguided Rocky Mountain Bighorn sheep tag in the state. She’ll also be the only hunter in her unit for the hunt.

So, here we are. We’re going to be Sheep hunters. We have no idea what we’re doing, but we’re going to figure it out. This will be a DIY adventure and I hope to keep this thread alive through it all. We don’t have many people in our lives that really care or understand this opportunity, so this the greatest place to share the journey and we greatly appreciate any input, opinions or wisdom!

Here is my bride, in all her glory. Please wish us luck!

View attachment 181128

Good luck! That is awesome.

 

[Hideserthunter]

That is unbelievable! Congrats to you guys. That is a couple truly unique experiences.

 

[kiwi hunter]

ill be along for the ride too

 

[MITCHMO]

Congrats!!

 

[Wallydeuce]

Enjoy the experience. I'm not a sheep hunter but I'll be following your adventure.

 

[RatRodMike]

Congratulations! That's awesome. I drew a sheep tag in Washington State this year so I'll be excited to f0llow your family's exploits this year.

Good luck,

Mike

 

[KayakMacGyver]

We’ve been playing whack-a-mole with life all summer and I’m beginning to wonder if a sheep tag carries with it some mystical powers of both good and evil. There have been a couple of moments where we weren’t sure this was going to happen. In fact, as I type this update, we still aren’t sure it’s going to happen, but we’re giving it everything we’ve got.

I planned a trip to New Mexico from Florida for July and made the most out of a long weekend. We have two young kids at home, which meant Alicia wouldn’t be able to join the recon mission. A good buddy of mine, Kevin, offered to join me and it would be his first trip east of Texas. He’s an adult-onset big game hunter and has always been interested Western hunting experiences. This would be a great starter trip for him to see what the mountains are like and hopefully kick his butt in gear to make his dream come true of hunting Elk with his bow sooner than later. Plus, it would be great to have a buddy along to share the experience as I’m usually flying solo.

It was about 7.5 miles from the trailhead to our campsite and we both got nice dosing of a western butt-kicking. Big lesson learned, trust the trail you’re actually on and not where your screen says it should be. We put a little too much faith in OnX and took a long detour up very rugged terrain that humbled both of us.

Thanks to some helpful guidance from a prior tag holder, we were able to find sheep within 10 minutes of breaking out glass the first afternoon. At one point, I counted 19 different Rams on the hillsides in front of us. This was a really great way to be able to put the size into perspective and helped me understand what the mountain had to offer.

Out of all the Rams seen over the course of 3 days, only two appeared to be of an age class worthy of consideration. Even so, their horn size wasn’t shocking in a way that suggested we had located a true #1 Ram yet. Alicia and I were planning to spend a full 2 weeks on the mountain, if necessary, for the hunt. The Rams that Kevin and I saw on the scout trip gave me confidence in that game plan and our potential for finding a tank of a Ram with so much time at our disposal.

After this trip I bought a Phone Skope, so we hope to have some better quality photos during the actual hunt. These were all taken just pointing the phone through the glass.














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[KayakMacGyver]

When I returned from the trip, Alicia and I had lots of questions for the Sheep Biologist for New Mexico Game and Fish. Those folks are super helpful and have built an amazing program. It’s very obvious they love their job and the wildlife is better off because of everything they’re doing. There is a ton of really useful data made public that helps you on a sheep hunt like this. At the end of the day, we all share a common goal and the state is also very interested in hunter observations since their own field time is limited. Good field notes show that you’re credible and accurate, which makes the data you report useful and I feel like going this extra step helped me squeeze useful information out of the Biologist that may not have otherwise been offered.

Shortly after they conducted a ground survey this year I was able to compare my information with what they had observed. According to the Bio, we could assume there to be a known population of ten more sheep on top of our known totals. That’s a statistical extraction, but this is roughly our expectation when it’s time to return for the hunt.

In conversation, the biologist believed there was at least one group of larger Rams that we were both missing. The game plan for the hunt would be to arrive a couple of days ahead of the tag start date and attempt to locate this group. Based on the comings and goings of the sheep that I had observed in July, my theory about where they lived would be another 2 miles deeper. A spike-out is going to be an option in the tool kit of the August hunt.

 

[KayakMacGyver]

Fast forward, it's late July and we were really racking the miles up in our physical conditioning for this hunt. We had both been training 4 days a week and hitting new personal fitness goals regularly. I find that hunting out West has brought a renewed physical purpose to strive for that makes life feel great. Exercise has so many mental health benefits, but I find that unless I have some event to work towards my motivation to stay in shape diminishes. I end up filling that space with piddling, tinkering, and breaking stuff during winter lull months and I quickly get stir crazy, so the process starts back up again.

We’ve got two big variables at home that have an impact on personal health. Wouldn’t trade them for the world, but we have two kids under the age of 5 that are dirty mongrels. I think someone has been sick in my house every month for the last two years. The kids were kept out of daycare early, and we’re paying the price for that as everyone’s immune system catches up. Needless to say, it’s a constant threat to any plans we make as a family that someone could be miserable during the fun.

Two weeks before our planned departure, the kids got sick. Then, Alicia got sick. All of them seemed to recover quickly and I’m basically just waiting for my turn. It always plays out this way, where I’m the last one to get sick in the house and usually get sicker than the rest of them combined. Then it came, and I threw every voodoo magic medicine you could imagine at it to try and remain healthy. It was all in vain, though, I got sicker by the day.

 

[KayakMacGyver]

The symptoms started with what I would describe as spaciness. This feeling was like walking around drunk and not having had a sip of alcohol. It would last for long periods and I had heaviness in my chest. Most of the time I noted it during and immediately after heavy exercise and just figured the 105 Florida Heat Index was baking me out. The symptoms progressed to a dry cough, followed by head congestion, a low-grade fever/aches, and nausea. Days, before we were scheduled to leave a test result, confirmed I am now a zombie having contracted Covid 19. Just before I got my results back lost smell and taste, which sunk the dagger.

At this point, I’m the only one sick but we’re just assuming everyone else also has it. Figured the kids brought it home and everyone else just had a different reaction. Nonetheless, they all got a test and just figured we would have to wait out my illness. The next morning, Alicia woke up feeling like crap. The same progression of symptoms that I had and now we’re both in the can. The kids' test came back negative, so they were able to stay with family while we recovered.

I generally run 4 miles an outing. With this covid crap, I don’t know that I’d be able to run 4 miles in a week. It’s a brutal sickness and something I was prepared for but not truly understanding of. Needless to say, our plans were put on an immediate halt while we focused on getting healthy.

 

[KayakMacGyver]

That brings us to the current day, August 8th, 2021. We got on the road late last night after having made it through our 10 day isolation period. We needed every single day of it. The lingering effect of this crap is like a bad chest cold, and we're not really sure how all of this is going to play out at altitude. Our expectations for the hunt had to adjust with the conditions, but after already coming to grips with a sheep hunt not happening while laying in our sickness for days on end, we feel lucky just to be in the game right now.

We're losing 5 days of the 10 day hunt and are trying to bank as much physical advantage as possible. I spent a bunch of time on the phone while we were sick and lined up some horses for a pack-in and out. It's not cheap, especially given the conditions, but it is going to give us the opportunity to conserve our bodies until we reach the top of the mountain. Using the intel gained from the July trip, we hope to loaf around for a couple of days and locate a Ram we want to go after. At that point, we hope our bodies will be acclimated and recovered enough to make a push on a Ram.

By the time we make it to the top of the mountain, it will be Wednesday afternoon (8/11). Until then, we'll be relaxing taking it easy at medium elevation with no service. We've got until Sunday to get it done and look forward to reporting back soon.

 

[Dave N]

Keep the faith, man! You've got this far. Time to finish the journey. Hoping for the storybook ending!

 

[Valley1320]

Hoping it all works out for youall and you get a ram!!! Definitely following along

 

[JLS]

Best wishes!

 

[brownbear932008]

Good luck and I look forward to reading the story of her taking a big ram

 

[Bluffgruff]

I hope this is selling vaccination for some young and healthy people on this forum. Hunt of a lifetime put in jeopardy by bad luck.
Good luck on your hunt, I hope you guys are able to kick the crud and manage the altitude!

 

[RobertD]

good luck man, I'm sure you guys will get on a ram