Dave Windauer"s Beautiful Bighorn!!

[PA stickbow boy]

[Beth Windauer]

The next trip I headed down to the sheep area with my dad again on Sept. 14th for a couple days.  The first morning was foggy and rainy and it was tough glassing through intermittent holes in the fog.  We did happen to spot a group of about seven rams with a couple that were worth taking a closer look at.  We made our way up the mountain, then split up. Dad hiked up a different drainage to watch for other sheep while I climbed up and over a ridge to the next drainage where we had seen the group of seven rams.  I wandered in the fog in the direction I thought the rams were.  I did hear rocks clanking together from the sheep crossing a rockslide but could not see the bunch of rams in the fog.  As I hiked through the fog heading back to dad, I did see a group of smaller rams.  It was a neat site to see their ghost-like shapes appear that close in the clouds.  I left them and as I dropped elevation, the visibility increasingly improved.  I spotted more groups of sheep as I crossed the ridge back into the first drainage and one of them was by himself just below a knob directly across the drainage about ¾ of a mile away.  I took my spotting scope out of my pack to get a good look.  It was my ram with the chunk out of his horn in a great stalking position.  I dropped into the drainage then up the other side and circled around to come up over the knob from the backside.  It was wet and quiet and the terrain was mostly grassy with a little brush to weave through.  I was moving rapidly and closing the gap quickly.  I was getting closer and being more cautious as more of the side hill was exposed.  It was a reoccurring nightmare when I could see the tops of the rams horns again looking strait at me.    The wind was good so he must have somehow heard or seen me.  Again, he took off and didn't look back. The next day we spotted more sheep but again, not the right one.  

Hoping to get some pictures my brother took of the terrain. Beautiful country!

[Beth Windauer]

My brother and I spotted my ram early on the second morning on the next trip to the sheep area. We got above him from the access road, hiked out to a vantage point where we spotted the ram again.  He was out in the open, grassy basin above the cliffs and steeper country below.  I was planning a stalk while Mike got a few pictures of him through his spotting scope.  He was gradually working his way toward the rougher country as I began closing the distance.  Mike had his three boys (still sleeping) that he had to get back to so he decided to stay back and watch until he had to leave.  He was planning to do some bear hunting with his boys. The ram moved ahead of me out of sight feeding slowly down the rocky ridge.  I finally spotted the ram about 35 yards in front of me and he hadn't spotted me yet.  He crossed the ridge in front of me at about 35 yards but it felt a little far so I passed. The ram crossed the rocky ridge in front of me and made it into a rock slide and up into another small ridge spine about 60 yards away. I tried to stay with him, following him when he was walking straight away. But, I think they have eyes in the back of their horns and he busted me again.  I thought I might get away with it because I was screened by a small tree.  The stare-down lasted about 5 minutes it seemed, and then he turned and ran down a few benches to about 150 yards away. I watched him for about an hour until he finally bedded there. I started my next stalk on him.  When I got in about 50-60yards, he heard me and headed downhill again. I lost sight of him so I scouted the benches below sneaking and peaking over ledges, but had no luck finding him. I finally gave up after about an hour of looking and started to head back up the mountain toward my truck.

I stopped to take a rest after about 5 min of climbing and ended up spotting the ram out in the middle of a huge cliff across on the next ridge from me.  He was about 400 yards away, not looking in my direction, but I think he was probably watching me the whole time from that vantage point.  I thought about trying to get to him but there was a huge rockslide between us.  Besides that, he was bedded on a small shelf on the face of a cliff. There was no way I was going to attempt that.  I was starting to feel a little discouraged and beaten by this point so I opted to head to my truck and leave the ram.  After reaching the truck, I headed back to the bottom to watch to see if he would move and possibly give me another opportunity.  After about 5 minutes of looking at him through my spotting scope, he got up.  He then walked up the small shelf and out onto the top of the ridge where he then began to feed.  It was about 3:30 or 4:00 with a few hours until dark so it took me a few minutes to decide if I should try again or leave him alone and look for another ram.  The next thing I knew I was heading back up to the top to go give it one last try before the day was over.  I hiked over to the same ridge he was on and started still hunting down the ridge to the ledge where he came out and where I last saw him.  I thought I would see him if he was out feeding somewhere but I didn't.  I figured he must have gone out onto the side of the ridge, so I started side hilling through the small cliffs and benches. After about 100 yards I peaked around a rock and there he was bedded on a large rock about 30 yards away looking straight at me. Between the small ledge I was standing on and the rock wall I was against, I could not   draw my bow.  I immediately nocked an arrow and climbed a few steps to the next little bench above me.  As my feet reached the bench, the ram began to stand and I was at full draw when he turned broadside.  The arrow was on the way and buried up to the fletch.  The ram took off away from me and disappeared behind some small rock cliffs about 30 yards from where he was bedded.  It looked like he was heading for a small saddle in the ridge that I had come down. I ran to intercept him but I did not see anything or hear anything.  On the other side of the saddle there was a huge rockslide and I figured he would be visible if he went out on that.  I waited and listened for a minute, checked the saddle for blood and did not find anything.  I slowly began working my way back to where he was when I shot him.  I was scouring the hill below but I was looking too far.  The ram was right in front of me about ten yards away.  He had fallen just as he went out of sight only about 30 yard from where I hit him.  I could not believe that I finally was going to be able to walk up and handle that awesome animal.  It was like a dream.  I feel really fortunate and thankful to have hunted such a magnificent animal and will never forget the experiences from that sheep hunting adventure.

      Another image of a group of rams
 

My ram taken from a scope
 


 

[Bowwild]

Excellent report. Very REAL hunt with many of the ups and downs we come to expect.  What a beautiful animal.  If you could curve those limb tips a bit that looks like my bow --- about 4 months early!!??

[cacciatore]

Congrats once again,for sure a hard hearned trophy.

[CDR]

Awesome job for sure! Congrats!!

What was your specs on your longbow and arrows?

[guspup]

Great Story, thank you.

[wasapt]

Wow!!! You are getting a big hand shake from me on this one!! Super job, super story and super ram!!

[sticbow]

Dave & Beth   thank you very much for an awsome Christmas hunting story..that was great!!! i can still feel my heart beating..that whats its all about..

[meathead]

I like stories with a happy ending.  Congrat's Dave.  Thats a beautiful ram.

[PA stickbow boy]

Dave, Congrat's again!  Great story!  Is that a take down longbow w/ a recurve type riser you used?  I don't think I've seen this bow style before from you.  I like it!!  I may have to get another Silvertip  

[bro-n-arrow]

What an accomplishment!

[rushlush]

Thanks for the story, I had been waiting. What an awesome experience!

[Traddict]

Awesome story and pics. Thanks for sharing!

[Greg Szalewski]

That's a nice ram Dave. Congratulation!!! Thanks for sharing. It is a great story.

[Jeff D. Holchin]

Great job with the hunt and story!  What a ram and it was killed by a real bowhunter with a real bow.  Hard to top that.

[Jim Wright]

I have come back to this post a number of times to look enviously at the photos of your ram on the first page. As a young man, I lived in Billings and was able to spend a great deal of time pursuing sheep in the unlimited permit areas in the Beartooth Wilderness area northeast of Yellowstone Park. You are fortunate indeed to have drawn a permit and you have my congratulations on a magnificent trophy. I spent some time in sheep area 124 this past September with a bear tag hunting with my bowyer and friend Dan Toelke and I enjoyed myself immensely in the beautiful country there. Thanks for the added story and again, congratulations.

[Jimmy Hartzel]

Very nice Dave congrats on such a fine animal.

Wow...he is a keeper for sure!  

Congratulations - I have dreamed of hunting taking a ram like that since I started hunting with a bow...maybe 40 years ago or so.  Quite an accomplishment!

Tony

[Jeff D. Holchin]

If you had killed him that first week, you would have missed out on all that additional hunting and maybe not appreciated him as much.  You  earned that ram.