A Riflemans Wet Dream

[Kroil]

Northeast New Mexico. When I was hunting mulies we found some free ranging Aoudad living in the canyons and headers that cut up into the mesas. A hunting buddy on that trip killed a nice mature ram but we found another 'Herd" ram that was a whopper. Best of all, they only require a license and permission/land owner tag. So, I went back this January to try for one. I've taken my share of critters and I think I have the "boots on the ground" experience to say that these are one of the hardest animals to approach and kill that I have ever experienced. Any shot opportunity will most likely be at 350-550 yds. If you love pure spot and stalk for incredibly wary animals and love to hear a bullet go "THUD" at 400 yards, these goats are a must try. If they see you first, and they can at over a 1000 yards, you are gonna wear some boot leather. When you spook them, they just pick up and haul a** for the next mesa, or county. Sorry for the photo quality, I was using a disposable that day.
This is what the country looks like:




You will spend alot of time behind your glass:



Well, we never did find that Whopper but I did get lucky:



The "Poor Man's" bighorn:




As I said, sorry for the crappy resolution but I was using a cheap film camera that day and I can't resize the images for some reason, well, you know how that goes .....

Good Hunting.

[MuleyMadness]

That's pretty cool, how big is this one compared to the "whopper"?

[Kroil]

Oh, he's just a little fart compared to the whopper but i was even lucky to get him. This type of country is not condusive to hunting audad like say the Davis mountains in Texas. It is just not condusive to approaching these paranoid creatures. Here is a picture of my friend's auodad that we shot in November during their rut.



I'm starting to feel like a retard with this image resizing.

[southwind]

Looks great to me!

What was your weapon and cartridge?

[silvertip-co]

Good info and GREAT PICS. I got to look into this Aoudad thing. I like free ranging animals non-ranch animals.

[Kroil]

Silvertip,
If you go, head to west Texas. There are more and bigger sheep there and the country is better for spot and stalk. Just google "free range auodad" and there are several outfitters in the Davis and China mountains that shoot some 30"= sheep. I'm going back 'cuz I got Auodad fever BAD.

[Bearpaw]

These were New Mexico sheep on private land from last weekend.[img][img][/img]

[Kroil]

Those are nice bearpaw. We had seen sheep of that caliber back in november but when I returned in january, we could only find small bands of younger rams. After six days of trying I shot one of those younger ones and am going back for a big one. Nice job.