Bighorn Sheep

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Dave

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Baker County, Oregon
Coming home from our drive yesterday afternoon we saw three different bands of bighorn sheep. Had to a be a total of nearly 90 sheep. Each band had a collared ewe in it. I noticed that the last two we saw had consecutive numbers. You can tell from the pictures they aren't real spooky. In fact when they are on the road you have to slow way down or you might run one over.














 
Stocker Steve said:
How hard is it to get a tag?

Do yours have the periodic respiratory die offs like some other areas?

They give one tag for this area. About 450 people apply. I don't know about any die offs but I haven't been here very long. I know that the local game dept guys kind of consider them their pets. They are real happy when anyone kills a mountain lion because the lions do kill some of their sheep.
 
Used to walk up on sheep once in a while when deer hunting in the Missouri breaks. Plenty to time to kneel or sit and steady the cross hairs, before they trotted off.

How hard is it to get a mountain lion tag?
 
Stocker Steve said:
Used to walk up on sheep once in a while when deer hunting in the Missouri breaks. Plenty to time to kneel or sit and steady the cross hairs, before they trotted off.

How hard is it to get a mountain lion tag?

A mountain lion tag is $16 over the counter for either residents or non residents. Season is open all year. They do have a harvest quota but they never reach it. The trouble is that hounds are not allowed and that is the only dependable way to hunt cats. I found 5 lion killed deer within 500 yards of my house last winter. I need to work a little harder at finding them next winter.
 
Dave A mountain lion tag is $16 over the counter for either residents or non residents. Season is open all year. They do have a harvest quota but they never reach it. The trouble is that hounds are not allowed and that is the only dependable way to hunt cats. [/quote said:
Hounds are efficient, but cann't you also bait mountain lions, like you bait black bears or leopards?
 
Stocker Steve said:
Dave A mountain lion tag is $16 over the counter for either residents or non residents. Season is open all year. They do have a harvest quota but they never reach it. The trouble is that hounds are not allowed and that is the only dependable way to hunt cats. [/quote said:
Hounds are efficient, but cann't you also bait mountain lions, like you bait black bears or leopards?

I don't know that baiting them would work. They sort of prefer their own kills. Finding a fresh kill and tracking in a fresh snow or just plain dumb luck seem to work the best.
 
Black bears here prefer fresh meat or sweets. Out of date lunch meat is one of my favorites. The chemicals used in it allows that "meat" to keep for weeks at fall temps. The problem in the north is timber wolves. A pack will camp on the bait site, and keep everyone else out, if you use much meat. My brother is having the most bear baiting success this year with reject brownies. :nod:

Leopards are not so picky. We used to shoot special wart hogs over the course of a couple days, have them gutted and hung in the skinning shed to season, and then put them all out at once.

You may have so many deer around that the mountain lions are not very hungry? Perhaps catnip? ;-)
 
I had a couple friends who were pretty successful at baiting bears. One used outdated donuts and other pastries the other mixed molasses pretty heavy with ground grain and he also used peanut butter.
Wolves aren't here yet. But they are getting mighty close. The next BLM allotment over from one of my neighbors allotment, which make it 10-12 miles as the crow flies from here, is having wolf problems. Last I heard they had lost 3 cows and 7 calves to the wolves this summer. They raise some high dollar quarter horses. The mares and foals run on that allotment. They hadn't lost any horses but they were being run through fences. They pulled all the horses. I heard that they buried the cows which had been killed but the wolves dug them up. They never found any remains of the 7 calves. They just found 7 heifers at various stages of drying up.
 
We seem to have a pair of timbers move into our area every couple years. The fawn population goes way down, some cattle are put thru fences, and then the wolves disappear. They must move on to a better place.
 

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