Live Hunt - Bighorn Sheep Oregon

OP
WRO

WRO

WKR
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Nov 6, 2013
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Idaho
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4000 miles driving.

100 miles hiking scouting

10 days scouting.

4000 vertical feet in 5 miles today (up and down)

Watching my wife kill a 165 inch 10 year old ram on opening day.

Priceless. .
 

Wby257

FNG
Joined
Apr 4, 2014
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5
Awesome adventure thanks so much for taking us! I've been in that area several times and have seen the Rams it offers!
Congratulations on Baby #3!!!
 

lintond

WKR
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Mar 17, 2013
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Oregon
Good work down in God's Country! I hope to someday draw that tag also. Until then I'll just hunt deer and birds down there.
 
OP
WRO

WRO

WKR
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Messages
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Just finally got home, rams at the taxi, hitting the rack. I'll post the rest of the story tomorrow with all of the details.
 
OP
WRO

WRO

WKR
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So here is the not so readers digest version that'll fill in the missing details.

After my wife arrived on thursday night. We found her ram in the morning, checked out a couple more places and went back to camp. After she took a nap, we went out to a dry lake bed near the coglins to do a little shooting. There used to be indian camps in that area and that is where they made their arrow heads.

The whole lake bed was covered in obsidian chips.

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We did a little shooting and she was shooting diamonds as always.

Ben showed up that night, we had talked on the phone before but never met in person until friday night. He is a total animal and was a great help on the hunt.

We bedded the rams and the excitement began to build. We got up a 4:30, made breakfast and were at the trailhead by a little after 5 am. My wife lost her breakfast, (apparently the baby was more a little more nervous about the hunt than she was) and we started the hike up, For an easy sheep unit, we chose the roughest piece of ground to hunt.

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But she never complained and never stopped smiling the whole way up. I still could not be prouder of her or the effort she put in. She has way more heart and mental toughness than most of the men I know.

We started waiting at 9:00 for the shot opportunity on the rams and she missed at 10:00 am roughly. She was standing on her tippy toes on a ledge and the nerves got to her. Luckily the rams weren't scared. Looking back on that, jets do maneuvers over that country quite often I have heard sonic booms numerous times.

Jason and her crept closer and spent 30 minutes within 100 yards of the rams waiting for the shot. Jason forgot his shooting sticks so he had to get on his hands and knees have my wife shoot off his back. She made an excellent shot at around 12:00 with a 7mm-08 shooting 140 gr accubonds, after a 3 hour grueling wait on the mountain in temperatures that ranged between 35 and 80 degrees. (it was brutally cold and hot right after).

It impossible to describe the emotions when I found out the ram was dead, I am sure you could hear us yelling from 2 miles away. Ben and I immediately started are way up to the sheep, it was probably the steepest 300 yards I have ever climbed. She truly went to the top and earned her ram.

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Then the work began and it truly set in how steep the country was and how tough it was to get down.

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This is just a look at how steep the country truly was.

Here we are an hour on our way out as a group. It was tough, we all tried to take mommas pack, but there was no chance she would have none of it.
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OP
WRO

WRO

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After 13 hours on the mountain, we made it back to the truck..

We had to take the obligatory picture of her the the ram horns on the pack, if you look at the base of the rim directly behind her, that's where she killed the ram.

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Then the celebrating commenced, We had some beers on Ice in the cooler in the back of the truck. I don't think I have ever tasted a better beer in my life.

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We had a great night, Taylor put the tape to the ram, we barbecued Tri-tip, drank a little too much, and just took in the moment..

Out of all of the moments in my hunting career, this was the best. Watching my wife conqueror the mountain, seeing her pride in her accomplishment after numerous failed attempts to kill a big game animal, overcoming her fear of heights, and powering up a mountain after fighting morning sickness and basically not working out for three months prior. The amount of heart she showed and the determination she displayed was truly epic...

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Anyways we went in the next morning, had a great breakfast, got him pinned, said our thank you's to Greg and The Foz..
 
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OP
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Thank you all for following.. Its been an awesome wild ride.

If these people are reading, they all deserve a thank you..

Jason - You are rockstar, my best friend, and what you did for my wife and I will never be forgotten. (tell Cailee thanks for sitting the kids)

Ben - Great job caping, packing, and providing support.

Taylor - The scouting and help was epic.

Greg - You nailed the score, provided great info and were a pleasure to spend time with.

Todd - thanks for the loaner rifle, pack, ammo, and moral support.

John - thank you for the support and taking us to the range

Kyle - Enjoyed our scouting trip together

Woolley - thanks for the long term loaner 4 wheeler

John N - Swarovski rocks, loved the 15's, the El ranges were invaluable.

There are a bunch more that helped as well..

I think this is going to be hard to top.. But the semi live elk hunt in november for giant bulls should be close.
 
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OP
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Coming back from my wifes sheep hunt, I thought I'd post we used that worked well and what didn't.

Boots- My wife had literally brand new Kenetrak womens mountain extremes. With minimal break in they performed flawlessly. I'd highly reccomend 8" boots for ankle support.

I ran my mendels, jason had Lowas, and Ben ran La Sportivas all with no complaints.

Backpacks - My wife used an Elberlestock gunslinger, it was perfect for what we required her to carry (water, clothes, gun)

I ran my blacks creek Jim Horn, it's a good day pack but woefully inadaquate for sheep packing.

Jason had an Oregon Packworks pack that I will be upgrading too. Great pack.

Ben had a hornhunter and it worked great as well.

Sheep look a lot bigger than they actually are, we only ended up with 60lbs boned meat and the head/cape weighed about 30.

For tents - we both ran cabelas outfitter tents that held up to the 30mph winds well with 0 complaints.

For optics- we had a bunch, mostly Swaro's, I think at one point I was carrying 15K worth of glass in my pack.

El 8x32s - Light package, Glass is outstanding, but just not enough power for long range glassing.

El range 10x42's - Great for ranging, worked good for glassing, overall a good package.

New SLC 15x56 HDs- WOW, these are the single best piece of glass I have ever used. Put them on a tripod and you can pick apart canyons at an unfathomable pace.

STX 85 spotter - I spent about 60 hours behing the glass using this scouting and on the hunt. There is no better, we also had a STM 80 hd that was an awesome scope, just couldn't keep up past three miles.

Lieca Geovids 10- Great piece of glass, good range finder, but needed angle comp and a bit more light transmission

Cabela Euro's in 10x42 not hd, Not in the class of the rest of the glass we used, but surprisingly not bad.

For the rifle, we used a model 700 stainless 7mm-08 in a BDL. Great rifle for my wife to use, relatively small amount of kick and the 140 grain accubonds put the whup in the sheep. It had a 3x9 baush and lomb scope, personally I would like a little more power and paralax focus but at 80 yards, it didn't matter.

Clothing - I used the cabelas tactical pants for scouting and they worked excellent, lots of pockets and they wore like iron. On the hunt I work russel l3 gear, after 5 years its still going strong. We all wore UA shirts, my wife wore the cabelas outfither pants that were great. One guy loved his sitka ascent pants and the other raved about his cotton pants.

Other essentials - Good tires are a requirement, I ran toyo open country 10 plys and didn't have single flat. I wouldn't go to the desert without 10 plys again. I ran 6 plays on my toyota and had numerous flats, and ate 2 6 plys on my old truck in 1 trip a few years back.

Brought the quad down and hardly used it, (depending on where we found the the sheep it could have been invaluable as driving your truck in the desert is the gift that just keeps giving) took the motorcycle and it was highly useful for scouting.
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