Dall Sheep Double

t_boneking

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This might be a long post. In 2020 my mom and dad got called to serve a church mission in Alaska. My dad quickly fell in love with Alaska. When my dad had time he would go look at Dall Sheep in the mountains behind his house in Anchorage. In 2022 my mom got diagnosed with cancer and my parents had to come home early from their 3 year mission.

While in Alaska my dad made some friends and met some people that were guides and outfitters. One of them was willing to take my dad and I on a 2 on 1 dall sheep hunt.

The hunt was originally scheduled for 2023 but the outfitter had something come up and the hunt was pushed to this year.
That worked well for us as it gave us time to focus on my mom’s health. She is now healthy and cancer free.

August 22nd came and it was time for us to leave Utah and head North. We arrived safely and after a few days of travel we made it to the mountains the evening of the 23rd.

The night we arrived at camp we immediately started to see sheep. We also saw a big grizzly about 700 yards from camp.
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August 24th (first day of hunting)
We woke up and hiked above camp to get a closer look at the ram from the night before. Upon closer inspection he wasn’t legal so we had to leave him alone. We spent the rest of the day hiking to a remote area. When we got close to camp we got in close on 8 other rams but none of them were legal.
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August 25th
We awoke to snow and fog in the higher country. We couldn’t located any of the sheep from the day before. We checked the weather and saw we were suppose to have bad weather for the next few days. We divided it would be best to leave the high country and head back to base camp. There we would be out of the fog and be able to see. We spent the rest of the day hiking back to base camp.
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August 25 (day three)
We woke up and somehow the weather had cleared. We were sitting in base camp and looked up on the big mountain behind camp and saw three rams. One of them looked pretty good but it was hard to tell in the fog. We waited for the fog to clear. When the fog cleared we got a good look and could tell he was a legal ram.
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We worked closer to the ram and set up for a shot. The ram walked to the edge of the ridge at 261 yards and I was able to make a good shot. It was an amazing feeling to take my dream animal. Thanks dad for letting me have the first crack at a ram!
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The day after I killed my ram we were once again hiking up the canyon. On the way up we found two rams that required a closer inspection. It turned out that the largest ram was legal. The stalk was one. We got within range and my dad set up for the shot. My dad took two shots at 400 yards. Both shots were clean misses. It was a steep angle and it was windy. My dad was pretty upset he felt like he had missed his chance.
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The next few days were spent trying to locate another legal ram. Sheep sightings became fewer and farther between, and I could tell that my dad was starting to wear down. It was going to to be challenging to fine my dad a ram. On day six I missed a black wolf. That miss is still haunting me.
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Awesome congratulations! I am not a dall expert but that looks really wide with a lot of flare, more than most dalls. Beautiful! Amazing scenery too.
 
Well, it came down to the last day of the hunt and we had kind of exhausted all of our options. We weren’t seeing many sheep and it was looking like my dad might not get a ram. We woke up and looked up on the mountain and saw four new rams. One looked decent so we decided to go take a closer look. We spent most of the day getting closer to the group of four rams. With a few hours left in the day we realized that the biggest ram wasn’t legal. We were pretty disappointed.
At that point the sun was going down and we were able to look up a little side canyon. We were able to see another group of rams. One of which was legal. He turned out to be the same ram that my dad had missed a few days before.
The rams slowly were working their way towards us. They eventually fed behind a small rock outcropping and we ran to get into position. With a just a few hours left in my dad’s hunt he was able to make the shot and take a beautiful ram. My dad was thrilled to have finally taken an Alaska dall ram.
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Nice job on the rams (y)

Looks like Alaska Range with the wide spirals.

I've hunted with my son a couple of time, but never with both of us having tags.
 
Congratulations to you and your father. I think I seen that same picture on the gram it’s a cool pic with the two rams beside each other. Alaska is an amazing place. What outfitter did you go with ?
 
Congratulations to you and your father. I think I seen that same picture on the gram it’s a cool pic with the two rams beside each other. Alaska is an amazing place. What outfitter did you go with ?
It was a small outfitters that my dad met while he was in Alaska. He doesn’t want much publicity so I’m going to keep that one quiet.
 

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