Dall Sheep Hunt NWT: Prelude
I'm writing this just days before departing from my home in Massachusetts for the long trip north west to the Mackenzie Mountains of North West Territories (NWT) to hunt dall sheep. I should have gotten this done sooner, but its been hard getting caught up at work after the Alberta spring bear hunt while getting ready for this hunt, and keeping things on an even keel both at work and at home. Time seems to fly by faster every year!
In any case, I wanted to share some of the planning for this hunt with all you nice folks at www.bowhunting.net to give you a better understanding of what I hope we'll be in store for on this "on line" hunting experience, and to share some pointers that may help you plan your next adventure. By forging ahead with these trophy hunting adventures, and sharing experiences along the way, we hope some of you will learn from my mistakes and save yourselves some of the heartache of learning the hard way.
This will be my fourth attempt to harvest a trophy class dall sheep ram with the bow. I'm nothing if not stubborn! The first three attempts failed for a variety of reasons, not the least of which was bad luck, but all contributed to my opinion of how to plan this attempt. When planning a hunt like this, one first has to look at the potential area, or areas, where the species exists in reasonable numbers. One also must look at trophy potential, seasons, costs, availability of guides, equipment needs, and conditioning. I started by trying to narrow down the area. Dall sheep can be hunted in Alaska, the Yukon, and the NWT. I've always found the weather "unfriendly" in Alaska, and therefore eliminated that area from the selection process.
Dall Sheep are found in the Mackenzie mountains that actually separate the Canadian Provinces of the Yukon and NWT, with sheep found on both sides of the Provincial boundary. The hunting, and trophy quality, is therefore similar in each area. At first I was leaning toward the Yukon for a few reasons.
First, I hadn't hunted there before (the first three attempts were all in NWT).
Second, most of the outfitters in the Yukon do their sheep hunts via horseback, which I felt would be a welcome break from the prior backpack hunts.
Third, hoping to be successful early in the hunt, the Yukon has a grizzly season and most outfitters will let you harvest a good bear on an "opportunity" basis for a trophy fee. I know I'm dreaming, but wouldn't it be great to snag a grizzly as a "bonus" animal on a sheep hunt? By the time I worked through the selection process however the outfitter I wanted to hunt with was booked for the first weeks of this season, and I didn't want to delay the trip for another year. That narrowed things down to NWT.
There are eight outfitting areas in NWT that offer dall sheep. I'm sure they all have satisfied clients, and I know they all offer the potential for trophy class rams. Because I wanted to try something different, and had hunted at Nahanni Butte all three prior times, I crossed them off the list. Given that they are the best known dall sheep outfitters for bowhunters, I may have shot myself in the foot!
Without much additional research I chose Eric Mikkelson's NWT Outfitters as my first choice. I've been talking to Eric about his special bowhunts for Mountain Caribou for a couple years, but we hadn't been able to put together a hunt that matched both our schedules.
In the seven years he has had this area he has not taken a bowhunter for sheep, but was confident that if I gave him a chance he could help me succeed. With his confidence, and his bowhunting experience/commitment on caribou (and moose), I decided to try to work out the right dates. To "sweeten the pot", Eric offered to have his most experienced sheep guide work with me, and explained that "Slim" had years of experience guiding bowhunters on successful sheep hunts for both Stone and Bighorn rams. That did it! As an additional bonus, it was explained that I would get a chance to hunt mountain caribou if I got my ram early in the hunt.
To Recap:
have arranged a hunt in a trophy managed and trophy rich area for the target species, with an outfitter that has an exclusive area and a commitment to bowhunting. He has arranged to loan me his top guide, and one with years of solid bowhunting experience on mountain sheep.
Then he threw in the potential to add another species I need for my super slam, and we arranged to access the area, and move if need be, via helicopter. I would have gone at that point even if the rest of the camp was to be gun hunters, but Eric claimed the camp was booked full with other bow benders for the entire time of my intended stay. I feel real good about this hunt for all these reasons, plus my bad luck "has" to run its course one of these days!
I hope you all will join me on the day to day hunt updates, and keep those fingers crossed that I can shake the bad luck that followed me on the three prior hunts. Catch you in a couple days as I head north.