mozey
Long Time Member
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- 3,052
Had the privilege of helping one of my employees on his first barbary sheep hunt. He and his buddy and been working Unit 30 since Monday without seeing any. After driving down from Rio Rancho half the night I met up with them in their camp at about 12:30 yesterday afternoon.
I got a sense they had been looking from too high an elevation, so they agreed to try it the mozey way. We drove out to the end of a point and started hiking down a ridge. We were about a mile from the road when his friend spotted their first barbary on a nasty looking ledge across the canyon at about 800 yards. We quietly worked our way to within 360 yards and got set up for a cross canyon shot, but I told him to wait because it bedded facing directly at us. From where we were, the canyon looked deeper than it was wide. We looked down at our gear just to check that everything was ready, and when we looked up again the barbary was gone! We never saw it leave or even which direction it went. I couldn't believe that it had bolted out of there so fast from a bedded position. I kept glassing for the next several minutes when I finally spotted a barbary running just below the ridge of the next slope over at about 1600 yards. When he finally stopped I got the spotter on him and pretty much confirmed it was the same ram. Amazing to me the terrain he crossed in that short time. He calmed down and started browsing. It was getting very close to dusk, so we decided to come back after him in the morning.
This morning we were back there just after sunrise, we positioned the friend on the ridge just above where we last saw him, and we were on the ridge just above where we first saw him, and we kept in contact with radios. We snuck down to a rock outcropping and peaked over the edge into the bottom of the canyon far below. Immediately we heard some rocks go rolling on the opposite side. We strained our eyes until we finally spotted him working his way up and and away from us at 460 yards. I got the bog pod down and he got off his first shot. I flinched and jumped at the shot myself, and was not able to tell him where his shot hit, but the ram was obviously not hit and was now moving directly away but not gaining anymore elevation. Three more shots, the results no different from the first, but now the friend is yelling at us over the radio asking us where it's at.
I watched it long enough to watch it finally stop and bed behind a rock, just a few yards from the bottom of the drainage. I was thinking this is good: I can use the radios to guide the friend right down on to him. The friend started working his way to it, when I saw the ram get up and walk down behind another rock that was right in the bottom. I didn't see him come out so I assumed he bedded again. I kept watching that area while talking the friend into it over the radio, when the friend radios back and says there is a barbary working his way up the same side we're on towards a patch of junipers on the ridge. I looked back up the ridge for the patch of junipers and it lined right up with where I thought the barbary was bedded below, and knew that darn ram had slipped us again. We took off at almost a run back up the ridge we'd spent the morning hiking down. Out of breath, we got to the edge of the juniper patch just as the friend radioed us that the ram had crossed over on the opposite of the junipers and was now where he couldn't see it anymore. We dropped off onto that side and started working our way along as quietly as we could. It only took about 30 seconds when my employee gave ME the "PSSST" and motioned me to get out of the way. He jumped down to a prone position, got his bipod extended, and promptly scoped himself...
BARBARY DOWN!!
Awesome ram, better than any I've ever shot or been part of a hunt on. And almost as awesome, where he went down was exactly 115 yards from where we parked my truck this morning. I've heard of things like this happening to other people, but truly thought they were fairy tales. I've never been on a barbary hunt where anyone was able to get a barbary out whole before.
That ram was so wily that it truly took a team effort to harvest him. The friend and I insisted the shooter pose for the camera without cleaning away the blood from his scope injury:
I needed to leave as soon as we got it back to camp, and none of us had a tape measure, so I can't say yet exactly how big he is.
I got a sense they had been looking from too high an elevation, so they agreed to try it the mozey way. We drove out to the end of a point and started hiking down a ridge. We were about a mile from the road when his friend spotted their first barbary on a nasty looking ledge across the canyon at about 800 yards. We quietly worked our way to within 360 yards and got set up for a cross canyon shot, but I told him to wait because it bedded facing directly at us. From where we were, the canyon looked deeper than it was wide. We looked down at our gear just to check that everything was ready, and when we looked up again the barbary was gone! We never saw it leave or even which direction it went. I couldn't believe that it had bolted out of there so fast from a bedded position. I kept glassing for the next several minutes when I finally spotted a barbary running just below the ridge of the next slope over at about 1600 yards. When he finally stopped I got the spotter on him and pretty much confirmed it was the same ram. Amazing to me the terrain he crossed in that short time. He calmed down and started browsing. It was getting very close to dusk, so we decided to come back after him in the morning.
This morning we were back there just after sunrise, we positioned the friend on the ridge just above where we last saw him, and we were on the ridge just above where we first saw him, and we kept in contact with radios. We snuck down to a rock outcropping and peaked over the edge into the bottom of the canyon far below. Immediately we heard some rocks go rolling on the opposite side. We strained our eyes until we finally spotted him working his way up and and away from us at 460 yards. I got the bog pod down and he got off his first shot. I flinched and jumped at the shot myself, and was not able to tell him where his shot hit, but the ram was obviously not hit and was now moving directly away but not gaining anymore elevation. Three more shots, the results no different from the first, but now the friend is yelling at us over the radio asking us where it's at.
I watched it long enough to watch it finally stop and bed behind a rock, just a few yards from the bottom of the drainage. I was thinking this is good: I can use the radios to guide the friend right down on to him. The friend started working his way to it, when I saw the ram get up and walk down behind another rock that was right in the bottom. I didn't see him come out so I assumed he bedded again. I kept watching that area while talking the friend into it over the radio, when the friend radios back and says there is a barbary working his way up the same side we're on towards a patch of junipers on the ridge. I looked back up the ridge for the patch of junipers and it lined right up with where I thought the barbary was bedded below, and knew that darn ram had slipped us again. We took off at almost a run back up the ridge we'd spent the morning hiking down. Out of breath, we got to the edge of the juniper patch just as the friend radioed us that the ram had crossed over on the opposite of the junipers and was now where he couldn't see it anymore. We dropped off onto that side and started working our way along as quietly as we could. It only took about 30 seconds when my employee gave ME the "PSSST" and motioned me to get out of the way. He jumped down to a prone position, got his bipod extended, and promptly scoped himself...
BARBARY DOWN!!
Awesome ram, better than any I've ever shot or been part of a hunt on. And almost as awesome, where he went down was exactly 115 yards from where we parked my truck this morning. I've heard of things like this happening to other people, but truly thought they were fairy tales. I've never been on a barbary hunt where anyone was able to get a barbary out whole before.
That ram was so wily that it truly took a team effort to harvest him. The friend and I insisted the shooter pose for the camera without cleaning away the blood from his scope injury:
I needed to leave as soon as we got it back to camp, and none of us had a tape measure, so I can't say yet exactly how big he is.
