DIY Barbary Sheep OTC Hunt Summary Eastern NM

arri1942

Lil-Rokslider
Joined
Jan 29, 2017
Messages
182
Location
NE Oregon
Part 1

This is my first attempt and telling one of my hunt stories here on Rokslide. Hopefully at the worst it doesn’t put you to sleep and at the best is an enjoyable, entertaining read. Last year my brother drew an Oryx tag in New Mexico (he lives in El Paso and is a Rokslider as well d3ntalbliss). The hunt dates he was assigned were January 13 and 14th (It is a two day hunt on military training grounds). I was excited and volunteered (or invited myself) to go along with him and hopefully help and film, etc. I bought my plane tickets and was excited for the adventure.


His plan was to Bow hunt for a day and then carry the boom stick on the second day if he was unsuccessful. About a month or so before the hunt date he let me know he got an email stating his hunt date had been moved because of military missile training in the area to the following weekend. Unfortunately for him, he couldn’t hunt the following weekend because he had a professional conference and job interviews to go to.


After weighing the options: 1)OTC barbary sheep in NM 2)Leftover Javelina 3)OTC Mule Deer in AZ) it was decided we would try an OTC diy Barbary sheep hunt in Eastern New Mexico; mostly due to proximity to El Paso and slight familiarity with the area. We had hunted hogs and javelina in Texas and talked to a guide there about aoudad and it sounded like fun. Main difference between New Mexico and Texas was price and immediately available OTC tag. We started to ask around and gather as much data as we could. We knew January wasn’t the ideal time of the year to go and we had a very short window to go but we figured it would be fun to get out and spend time together and try some new gear.


If we weren’t successful in harvesting an aoudad it would still be fun and an excuse to hang out together. Between my license and tag I think it was about $430 and it is an all year round OTC either sex hunt (April-March) so my tag would only be good for 3 months.


We combed over google earth and onX maps, watched youtube videos, and researched as much as I could, as did my brother. Big thanks to fellow Rokslider teamvit for his input and willingness to share prior experience and strategies. We narrowed it down to a few different canyons we felt would be good to find them. With the small window of a couple days we had to hunt, I will just say I wasn’t overly confident. Nonetheless, I was looking forward to being in the mountains and seeing some new territory with my brother.


After getting to El Paso, getting packed up, etc, my brother and I got to the top of mountain and had about 45 minutes to get out and glass. We thought that for short window to hunt that night we would have a better chance at a shot opportunity starting up top if we saw some sheep. In those 45 minutes we saw 15 elk or so with 2 really nice bulls and a rag-horn. Not what we were looking for, but fun to put my new spotter through its paces. After being up top and seeing from that side, we decided the next morning our plan would to be to hike up from the bottom and glass the rock faces and steep hillside for sheep.


We got up early the next morning and started up the trail in the dark and over the course of about 2-3 hours made it 2.5 miles up the canyon and found a good spot we decided to glass. Other than a marathon hiker across the canyon, we didn’t see anything. After a while, we decided to side-hill around a knob to check out a bowl on the other side of the canyon. We bumped a group of mule deer with a bunch of does and a decent 3x4 rutting and chasing tail. That is where the fun ended and the suck began. Where there was no trail, the hiking sucked. Loose rock, steep, cactus, bluffs etc. It was during this where I made realization #1 of the trip, I need a better pack with a good gun bearer, sling, etc. I was battling my rifle and bipod for the next 2 hrs while trying to not fall down the mountain.

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At this point it was just after noon and we needed to work our way down to the main trail. As I looked down, I wondered how that was going to go. It looked like there was no good way down. We slowly walked down the slope switching back, sliding on our backsides and finally found a wash out that was doable. As I finally got back to the main trail my brother trailed behind a bit. I leaned on my trekking poles and turned back to look for him and he had just made the main trail and he says “There’s sheep!” I thought he was joking but I looked up and about 500 yards across the canyon there was a group of sheep just jumping and hopping up a vertical rock face like is was nothing.

We hurried down the trail about 100 yards or so where there was an outcropping that was relatively flat to get set up and glass them up and get ready for a shot. I hoped for a ram, but the spotter revealed they were all ewes. That was ok by me. We spent some time and picked out what seemed to be the biggest ewe and got set up for a shot. It took us quite a while to get it all set up. Between both of us finding them and communicating their location and finally realizing we were looking at different square rocks and then my brother finding them in my 55mm objective spotter with a small field of view, and me finding them in my scope. The game was on!

I will finish editing (have some photo and video to edit) and share part 2 in the next couple days.




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mt100gr.

WKR
Joined
Jan 29, 2014
Messages
2,908
Location
NW MT
Yeah, good stuff. I will be in eastern NM this time next week. I have had Barbary Sheep on the brain for awhile now.
 

d3ntalbliss

Lil-Rokslider
Joined
Oct 31, 2016
Messages
194
Location
ID
So I am the brother who went on the hunt and thought I would share a few pictures from the morning and of the terrain.

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MIKEYB

WKR
Joined
Aug 29, 2012
Messages
312
I'm enjoying! Beats reading about politics any day of the week.

I really like the gun bearer, do not miss the sling at all and I leave the Bi pod at home and shoot of the pack.

I picked up one of these tags this month and have only went out one day so far, different area of the state. Trying to plan a trip down that way to look around at least.

Looking forward to the rest of the story.
 
OP
arri1942

arri1942

Lil-Rokslider
Joined
Jan 29, 2017
Messages
182
Location
NE Oregon
Thanks d3ntalbliss for posting link to part 2


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