Soon after I got the tag, I contacted Randy Johnson of High Desert Wild Sheep Guides. He encouraged me to get into the best shape I could because, in his words, “This may be one of the toughest sheep hunts in North America.” I was excited for the adventure but a little apprehensive too.
I drove into my unit in Southern Utah with one of my guides, Clayton Jones. Arriving after dark, we slept at the trailhead. The other guide, Alan Wood, arrived during the night, and we started hiking early the next morning. It took us seven hours to hike 11 miles into our first camp. It was very remote country with steep- walled plateaus carved over time by wind and water. On top of the plateaus, sandstone domes periodically broken by loose sand dunes and sparse vegetation were intermittently cut by gullies and washes. This was great Desert sheep habitat with a lot of places for them to hide.
Every day was about the same. Hike to a high point and glass for a couple of hours and then move to another point and glass. We saw very few sheep. The guides typically were looking for a ram that was at least 7 years old. This type of ram proved to be elusive.
On the fifth day, we were walking off a sandstone dome after glassing and I stepped on a three-inch thick sandstone ledge that broke. I fell to my hands and knees, and my gun hit the ground. It didn’t seem to have hit that hard, but we thought about shooting it to be sure. After discussing it, I decided not to, a decision I would later regret.
On the sixth day, we moved camp another four miles deeper into the desert to give us access to a specific peninsula that we had high hopes for. The next day, we started hunting down it and found a 6-year-old ram that let us walk within 100 yards of him. Later, he walked up within 50 yards while we were eating lunch. The guides were confident we could find an older ram. It wasn’t long before Alan spotted just this type of ram, but he was across the canyon near where our first camp had been. After a few pics and videos, we decided to go after him. It took us four hours to get all the way around to him. With the sun just above the horizon, we made our final approach. He had moved from the back of a small canyon to the point of a ridge, so it took us some time to find him. As we were walking out to the ridge, we spotted him to our left just over a small rise. He was standing on a sandstone ledge in the evening sunlight. I lay down prone on a rock and could see him clearly through the scope, facing me at 275 yards. I initially waited for him to turn broadside but grew concerned he could bolt at any moment. Feeling confident the gun was solid with a front and back rest, I squeezed the trigger. After the shot, he ran and it became clear I had made a clean miss. Later, I would shoot my gun and realize I had bumped the scope off when I fell. At 275 yards, I would have shot 14" to the right. We tried to find him until dark and then made the long four-hour hike back to camp. That day, we covered 15 miles, most of it on slick rock, and my feet were in bad shape the next day with blisters. Leukotape was a life saver and allowed me to keep going.
We continued to hunt the next three days looking for the ram I had missed or another mature ram but didn’t find any. On the eighth day, we glassed in the morning and then hiked 11 miles back to the trucks. In eight days, we had walked 80 miles and I was beat. I had never hunted this hard on any hunt before. Reality was hitting. After all that effort, I was going home without a ram. Randy told me I was welcome to come back and keep hunting until we got a ram. At the time, I wasn’t sure I would be able to.
The next trip down, my friend, Russ Purtzer, offered to go along and help glass. We made it into the unit on a Friday and met up with Alan and Clayton. We hiked to the top of a mesa and glassed for a couple of hours, spotting just one ewe, and then we made a long hike out to the edge of the peninsula, glassing as we went and making a loop back to the trucks. The next day was more of the same with no sheep spotted.
On Sunday, we loaded our packs with three days of supplies and walked out to another peninsula with the goal of camping five miles in. At four and a half miles, Alan spotted some ewes and a wide-flaring ram on the opposite peninsula. The ram was only 1,200 yards away, but we could not get close enough for a shot and the walls of the gulch were too steep to cross, so we had to go all the way back to the trucks, drive up the road a mile, and hike in from there. Russ stayed where we had spotted the sheep from to keep an eye on them while Alan and I made our way around. As we got closer to them, they started to move off and stayed just ahead of us until we watched them go over some sandstone domes right at the edge of the gulch we had just walked around. With another group of ewes bedded on the opposite side in plain view, we didn’t dare approach them. We set up our tents on the top of a mesa and weathered the wind and snow that fell during the night.
Monday morning, we were glassing as soon as we could. At about 9:15 a.m., our ram finally fed out from his nighttime hideout below us and it was game time. Once the sheep fed out of view, we dropped off the mesa and made it to a bench that the ram and ewes were heading toward. We got within 350 yards of them, but the wind gave us away and all the sheep blew out of there fast. We spent the next day and a half hunting the two closest peninsulas and did not turn up a single sheep.
Clayton had to leave Tuesday night, and Alan’s last day with us was Wednesday. Since time was limited, we decided to day hike into a peninsula that they had scouted but to our knowledge no one had hunted this fall. It was about five miles into the best glassing spot. We spotted 12 ewes and a smaller 5 to 6-year-old ram on the way out to this point. We stopped short of the top of the ridge so we could glass the area below before walking over the edge. After a couple of minutes we were about to step forward when Russ said, “Wait, I think I see something. It’s a ram!”
Just 1,600 yards below us, three rams and several ewes fed out onto a sandy flat. All three were mature rams with one standing out noticeably heavier. Russ stayed on this point while Alan and I made our way around some domes to get in position for a shot. At 420 yards, I was laying down prone on slick rock with the ram in sight. I squeezed the trigger, and we heard “click.” Alan said, “What the heck?” I ejected the shell and loaded another one. The ram walked behind a sandstone dome. Both of us were getting a little frantic at this point, but the ram walked into view again. This time, the shell fired, but I hit a little far back. I loaded another shell and “click.” Two factory shells didn’t fire. I quickly ejected this shell and loaded three more as the ram walked behind a dome. I was anxious that I may not get another shot, but after a couple of minutes, he walked out again. Two more shots and my 9.5-year-old ram was down for good.
One of Randy’s sayings is, “Sheep hunting is movement and angles.” Either the sheep need to move or we do and keep trying different angles of sight until you find them. Our hunting strategy was to keep moving and get different angles to glass from. In 14 days of hunting, we put about 130 miles on our boots. The weather ranged from the low 20s to mid 70s. A couple days during the hunt, we had to drink pothole water that looked like chocolate milk since nothing else was available. We got to explore a remote desert few see. It was an adventure I won’t forget. Thank you again to Randy, Alan, Clayton, and Russ for all your help on this adventure!
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