Utah Bighorn Sheep: A Young Man's Dream, An Older Man's Reality

Twenty-eight years of applying for Utah Deseret bighorn sheep came down to this one moment in time. In seemingly slow motion, I felt the recoil of the rifle and watched the ram leap forward along the cliff ledge.
 
For the last three years, I had researched draw odds and watched the applicant numbers with equal points decrease until I was sure I was in the top 10%. Sure enough, when the results came out, I was successful. I had drawn a southern unit bighorn sheep tag.
 
Huntin’ Fool Hunt Advisors had recommended the best areas to apply for and recommended Jake Bess with Jake Bess Hunting as a guide. Previous to applying, I contacted Jake and told him how many points I had and that it was my year to draw. We had talked about the possible units to put in for and then settled on a unit that had good access and a good population of sheep, and I submitted my application! Now I had the coveted tag.
 
I immediately called Jake. We settled on mid-October as a good hunt time, hoping the weather would be cool enough for the sheep to be active. I spent the rest of the summer getting myself and my .300 Winchester into “sheep” shape.


 
Two weeks before the hunt opened, I returned from the gun range and was putting my rifle away in the safe when it accidentally fell. Two days later, I headed back to the gun range to see if the fall had affected my rifle. The first shot was dead on at 200 yards, but the subsequent three were scattered all over the target. I was panicked! After two days and working with several professionals, my .300 Winchester was again shooting a nice group at 200 yards, but I only had three shells left. It should only take one to finish off my hunt, but that was too close for comfort. I was accustomed to my ammo and liked the way it performed. I knew there was a good possibility of needing to make a long shot and the 165-grain premium ammo shoots fast and level, leaving the muzzle with a velocity pushing 3,080 feet per second and 3,475 ft/lbs of energy. This was not the time to be changing ammo. We called every sporting goods store from Logan to St. George, and to my relief, Logan had three boxes. We requested they save the three boxes for us and started the two-hour drive to Logan.
 
My guided hunt did not start until October 12th, but the hunt opened on September 14th and I wanted to get my boots dirty. Besides, who can resist opening day of a once-in-a-lifetime hunt? Opening day found my wife and me glassing the desert of Southern Utah for sheep. We hiked out to points and glassed until the heat of the desert drove us to shade. The temperatures were still hitting 100 degrees in the middle of the day, and the sheep knew better than to be out in it. The scenery was breathtaking, but we saw no sheep.
 
After four days, we headed home to get ready for the guided hunt. I was scheduled to meet Jake Bess on October 11th, so early that morning, I left home, hoping to catch the evening hunt. Things were going smoothly until a trucker rolled up to my side and indicated that I should pull off the road for a problem. Luckily, I was near an exit and was able to pull directly into a gas station parking lot where I discovered a destroyed tire on my trailer, which had also torn out my brake wires when it disintegrated. Two and a half hours later, I was stocked with tires and new wiring and headed down the road again. However, I wasn’t going to make that evening hunt.
 
After arriving, I grabbed my gun, spotting scope, and binos and headed for a high spot to start looking until dark. Jake, his son Monte, and Chris Robb got back to camp at around 10:00 p.m. They had found a couple of groups of sheep with a ram in each group. After looking at some video, we determined that one of the rams looked older because of body size and was traveling with only one ewe. We planned to leave early the next morning to see if we could locate that ram.


 
By 6:00 a.m., we were on our way. It took an hour and a half to get to the high point they had been glassing from. On arrival, Jake and Monte loaded up the spotting scopes and headed to the high ridge while Chris and I glassed the low country, moving from one glassing point to another. After two hours of glassing, Jake spotted the ram and ewe. They were feeding along the ridge of a plateau and a deep canyon cliff. After consulting the map and the lay of the land, we figured they were about a mile and a half from where they were originally spotted, still feeding in the open. Chris and I dropped down into a ravine that headed in the general direction of the sheep but out of sight. We hiked for about a mile, locating the tracks as we went. The ravine eventually turned away from the plateau and headed for the canyon and cliffs, so we worked our way up onto the plateau. We walked and glassed, trying to locate the sheep. The plateau seemed flat with sage and scrub, but they had to be in a low pocket because we could not see them. The dry ground crunched at every step, so I started stepping in Chris’s footprints to make less noise. Suddenly, Chris stopped and motioned for me to put a shell in the chamber. With the gun on safety, we moved forward toward the north rim of the plateau. Chris whispered for me to be ready for a quick shot. We moved about 15 feet more when Chris suddenly sank to the ground. I followed his example and saw the ewe feeding just over the rise about 200 yards away. When the ewe moved behind brush, we crawled closer to the rim of the depression they were in. We had started moving again when Chris stopped and motioned me to move sideways behind a bush. The ram was laying down with his head up, listening. He knew something was there.
 
Chris was glassing the ram and then turned and said, “Kyle, this is a nice ram. Can you see his head?” I had to move slightly, but I could only see the tops of his horns. Chris whispered to be ready for an “off-hand” shot, and we judged the range to be 160 yards. We began inching forward to get a little better angle for the shot when the ram stood up and turned toward us, staring. He had us pinned down but could not figure out what we were. He kept sniffing the air, but the breeze was blowing towards us. The ram stepped to the side of the bush he had been laying by and stood broadside. Chris rotated sideways on his hands and told me to use his back as a rest and shoot. I took the gun off safety, got a steady bead just behind his shoulder, took a calming breath, and squeezed the trigger. In slow motion, I felt the recoil of the rifle, saw the ram leap forward, watched Chris jumped up to see where the ram was headed, and I bolted in another round. Putting the crosshairs on the ram, I started to squeeze off another shot when the ram flipped over backwards and lay still. I knelt there, rifle still trained on the ram.
 
Chris yelled, “You got him! Great shot!” I, however, just sat there soaking in the moment. What a beautiful place and what a beautiful animal!
 
Jake and Monte had watched the stalk through their spotting scopes. They were as excited as we were. According to the rings on the ram’s horn, we aged him around 8 years old. We took the usual pictures, caped him out, and packed everything up. I’m pretty sure the hike out was longer than the hike in.
 
I would like to thank the Huntin’ Fool Hunt Advisors who put up with several years of questions and recommended a great guide. I want to thank Jake, Chris, and Monte for their knowledge, patience, and wilderness experience. Jake has a great team to work with. I am grateful for my wonderful wife, Barbara, who has put up with my hunting obsession over the last 40 years. Hey, Honey, do you want to go on a vacation to New Zealand?