My 2021 RAM!!!!!

[recurveman]

Holy cow was this an adventure!!!!!!!   First, I started off by spending $2300.00 on a sheep tag.    Then I didn't know if my wife had the tag or if it was mine.    Luck ended up in my favor and I got a rebate for the additional money spent on the tag.   In all I made 5 scouting trips and one trip down for the hunt.   As it turned out I had 14 days of scouting (buddies had probably more days than me towards scouting).   After scouting ended, we had only seen sheep 1 out of the last 8 days of scouting.    I can't begin to tell you how difficult it is to sit there and glass for days on end and not see sheep.   We had a 3 day and then a 4 day stretch with seeing no wildlife.   We didn't even see a deer, rabbit, nothing.   As opening morning rolled around the feeling in camp was different than any other hunt I have been on.   Normally everyone is super excited and ready to go but everyone knew this could be day 5 with seeing no sheep.    We also knew this would likely be a hunt that lasted more than 10 days to get the job done.   Either way we knew that heading out before first light would need to happen.    We developed a plan and sent everyone to their spots to find the elusive ram.   After a solid hour of glassing, I decided to grab some grub out of my daily bag of food.  That went so well that I decided that grabbing something else would be even better......little did I know that would be the last food I had before dinner.    I kept on glassing and finally found a few white butts moving in the distance.    I told my buddy to get eyes on them and then grabbed my BTX's after he obtained them in his glass.   He started off by saying he could see 3 sheep and one was a ram.   Then he said that there were 4 sheep and all of them were rams.    Then his voice changed a bit and he said that one of the rams was really, really good.   Once I got my glass on the rams I could see one that was well above average.   We were sitting about 2.5 miles from the sheep.   We knew he was big enough to look at but we really couldn't judge him from that far away.   Luckily, we didn't have heat waves yet so we could tell that I needed to go in for a closer look.   I grabbed my pack, glass and rifle and off I went.   My buddy was going to stay and keep an eye on the rams.   My other buddies were off in the general direction of the rams so hopefully we could all meet up if this came together.   After a 2 mile walk (seemed like the longest walk of my life) I would see the rams up the mountain and decided to take a look at the bigger ram with my spotter.   He was with 3 other rams.  One of the rams was probably in the 150 class and he just looked tiny compared to this guy.   I was fairly confident that this was going to be my ram.    He had great mass all the way through.   He looked like he was turning up at the tips and seemed to have good length.   I'm far from a sheep expert but he looked good to me.   Well after looking at this ram at 1000 yards I decided to make my approach.   Off I went through a wash moving slowly (mostly because it was hot and I was tired) and gaining ground on the rams.    They were starting to look like they were going to bed.   I continued my stalk.    The rams decided to bed down in a spot where I could take a shot if I could get into position.   After a good chunk of time, I finally got as close as I could to the group of rams.   The bigger ram was at 462 yards and bedded down in a position where I couldn't have a good shot at him.   I knew that I would have to wait until he stood up before I could shoot.   I'm not a very patient guy so this was going to be a challenge.    I found a good resting spot and laid my rifle down on my pack.   At the time I could see the ram in my scope but I couldn't see his body.   It was now right at noon and the sun was just beating down on me.   This was not typical hunting weather in my book.   After about half an hour two of the smaller rams got up.   Now I'm on high alert because I'm sure the bigger ram is going to get up any second.   At many points I was shaking like crazy.....not because of nerves but I was just tired of laying behind my gun waiting for my ram to stand up.   Every so often I would put my head down and get off the gun just so I could take a few breaths and relax.    Then all of a sudden I look through the scope and the bigger ram stood up.   two seconds later there was a light click and then a big boom.   Big ram down!!!!!!!!   I was super excited but knew the work was just to begin.   My buddies joined me for a photo session and then we did a life size cape job on my ram.   After breaking the ram down into pieces, we went down the mountain and made the journey back to the glassing spot which was 2.5 miles away.   Luckily, we barely made it back before dark.   I was plenty thirsty.   It was 6pm and I was looking forward to getting some water in me and hopefully a good meal.   A few guys were heading to camp to help for the second day but their help would be needed to pack up camp.   We might have celebrated a bit and had ribeye's for dinner.    Life was good.   I was spent.   The reward was worth the effort and I feel very fortunate for all the help I received from many people.   Many of the people I only talked to on the phone and have never met in person.   I even had one buddy Greg that went down twice on his own to scout and found multiple good rams.   It's hard to believe so many people were rooting for me to find a big ram.......but that is sheep hunting.                   

[deercrazy]

congratulations, that is one heck of a ram!  Thanks for the story, for us guys sitting at the computer wishing we had a tag!!

 

[lefty]

that is a very nice sheep! congrats!

[Swivelhead]

It is really tough when not seeing sheep for days on end.  You finished very well, congrats on a really great ram.

[wish2hunt]

That can be a tough hunt. Congrats

[yotebuster]

Incredible ram!!  Congrats and thanks for the write up!

[AZBob]

Beautiful ram! Congrats!

[GreyGhost85]

Holy cow. What a ram. Congrats! Did i miss the unit? If not, do you mind sharing?

[CouesPursuit]

Congratulations on an incredible and beautiful ram! Most tag holders don't get both, well done! 

[Ernesto C]

BAS A$$ RAM!

[218buck]

Congratulations on your great ram

[AZ RANGER]

Congrats!  What a great ram!  Thanks for sharing. 

[Big Browns]

Very nice, Congrats!!!!

[WHT_MTNMAN]

Giant ram! So jealous! 

[AZHunter1]

Very nice ram! Way to go on sticking with it when you guys weren't seeing any!!