Day 5

We woke up and there was fog everywhere. 

It is useless to get out since we couldnt varely see anything, so we spent most of the day in the tent waiting for the weather to improve.

After lunch the weather improved a little, so we went out of the tent to quickly check one of the closest creeks.

In that creek we spotted a group of rams, but not exactly what we were looking for. It was great to see some rams though! They are one of the most beautiful animals on earth, aren’t they?

We went back to camp, hoping to have a better weather the following day.

Day 6

We packed the full camp with us, and in order to try to cover as much ground as possible, we hunted with it full-time.

We saw a few more caribou bulls,  but our main objective was the sheep, so we kept moving forward.

Shooting a caribou takes you one or two days to pack all the meat to a strip line, and maybe another day if you have to wait for the bush plane to land because of the weather. That can take you three days out of your sheep hunt, and at this stage that was not an option. This caribou pics were taken at just 40 yards..

It was a miserable day, but we saw two groups of ewes and lambs, and two groups of small rams. It look like we were getting closer, and that the rain had made the animals to move.

During the afternoon Mark flew over us to contact via radio to check we were still alive and that everything was going well. It was nice to have some news from Dad and Allen, they were both right but they had not been lucky yet.

Day 7

We woke up and headed to the top of the mountains to try to get to the next main valley.

We got as much water as possible on the last creek just in case we needed to stay on top for a few days. The camp setting was just awesome since we could glass miles and miles around us from it.

We spent the whole day glassing and glassing, and bit more glassing after that.

Although we were covering a lot of land from the top, looking at several valleys we did not see a single animal, no ewes, no rams, no caribous… nothing!

It was quite a frustrating day since we had already covered a lot of ground and we just had two more days left to hunt. We were running out of time.

On the other hand, Dad and Allen made it happen!!. It was awesome, I would have love to be there!

They saw from a long ways a group of rams with at least two shooters. After spending the whole day to get into shooting distance they had to wait for several hours for the rams to stand up to shoot the biggest one.

Dad made a great shot at 270 yards, putting down on its track a gorgeous ram. His face says it all!!.

Effort paid off! 

They still had to pack out the ram and get back to the camp which was miles ago. They actually arrive at camp at dark, which there that takes place after 12:00 pm. It was a long and tough day for everyone, but the reward worth the sacrifice. Proud of my Dad once again, one of the best hunters out there if not the best!

Stay tune for another update soon,

Good luck in the mountains,

Pedro Ampuero

Day 1

We flew in to a little cabin located in a small lake in the middle of the mountians. The place is just a paradaise.

We met there our two guides, two hunting legends having taken both more than a hundred sheep! I love to hunt with experienced hunters, you always learn new things to become a better hunter.

My dad will be hunting with Alan Klassen.

I will be with Jeremy Hatala.

We spent the rest of the day preparing the packs and all the things that will be with us for the next ten days. Before hunting you need to wait 12 hours after a plane flight, so there is not much to do than relax after three days of travelling.

It was pretty cool to see some bears playing in the lake. I prefer not to play with them though!

Day 2

We left Goober´s Cabin early in the morning and moved forward to a big valley.

We hunted all together, in order to warm up and enjoy hunting together for a few days.

We set up camp close to the river, left all the heavy stuff and started going up a creek to check one of the valleys.

We spent the whole day checking the valley, but we just saw a group of five very small sheep,nothing interesting. It is amazing how vast the land is, and how much land you can control.

We arrived at the camp, had some dinner and after a bit more glassing we went to bed.

Day 3

We had some breakfast and headed again all together to check the next valley.

I love the feeling of discovering new land everyday, that maybe has not been hunted for years. Its exciting!.

We arrived at the end of the valley a little bit past midday. We saw on our way up a group of some small caribou, but nothing worth trying, or.. worth packing!

We had some lunch, a little nap and started going back down to the tents slowly glassing in search of sheep coming out to feed in the afternoon. It looks like they were not hungry, since we didnt see any.

We arrive late to camp and we spot from the tents the two first sheep of the day. Two young rams and another ram that is so far away that we can not tell what it is.

Day 4

Since there was no many sheep in the area we decide to separate in order to have more chances. So we picked the camp and wish each other luck.

Dad went back towards the lake to check the valleys on the other side. Jeremy and I kept going down the main valley checking all the creeks.

We found a really nice bull close to a strip line so we spent most of the morning trying to guess what it was going to do. Caribous are the craziest animals on earth, and they suddenly went up the mountain and our chances vanished.

We kept going down the valley and spot another two very young rams, and a few more caribous.

At the end of the afternoon we set up camp as farther down the valley we can, we need to find sheep as soon as possible to have time to prepare a stalk with the bow.

The story will continue soon. Check for update!

Pedro Ampuero

This year has been really hot and dry in a lot of places, and eastern Wyoming is no exception. Usually this time of year I am hoping for no rain since that makes it easier to hunt the antelope of water holes, but this year has been too dry. The total amount of animals around where I hunt is way down and there are even fewer decent bucks to be seen. I don’t have any exact data but it also appears that only a handful of the does have fawns on them when in the past it seemed like each doe had twins running around. The next few years of antelope hunting may get really tough if this pattern keeps up.

For the past few years I have hunted land that the Wyoming Game and Fish calls Walk-In Areas. The Walk-In program pays landowners to allow hunting access on their property for certain species. In my hunt area alone there is over 54,000 acres enrolled in the program for antelope hunting. The Walk-In area that I hunt on is over 14,000 acres, so there is no shortage of places for people to hunt, and for free nonetheless. The one thing that does limit hunter access is that, like the name implies, people are only allowed to walk into these area on foot, driving vehicles in them is not allowed. Before the season, and before the Walk-In Area was officially open, I got permission from the landowner to drive in and place my blind near some water tanks. I did this a week before I would be hunting since I wanted the antelope to have some time to get used to the blind and feel comfortable coming around it.

My first day of hunting was August 17th. I sat in my blind until noon and since I had three small bucks and a couple does come in already I figured most of the action was over, so I headed out for the day. When leaving I could see a larger group of antelope in the distance, and they were most likely watering at a place that I knew well. It was a windmill that had a tree growing by it, and it was where I got my antelope in 2011.

I planned on hunting that spot the next day, and that is what I did. I had a doe come in at first light and then another three at 9 am. A couple bucks walked by at about 300 yards, but must not have been thirsty because they just kept on moving. Again I was only able to hunt until noon so my day ended without a shot opportunity.

For my third day of hunting I decided I would try my blind again. Things were pretty slow for the first few hours as I took some short naps, getting up every once in a while to check what was going on outside. Just before 9 am I was woken by a noise outside the blind. It turned out to be a calf rubbing on the blind as some cattle had come in to get a drink. I got up and got a drink and then opened a window and to my surprise a buck antelope was 30 yards away. I slowly closed that window and grabbed my bow. There turned out to be four bucks together and they were headed right for the water, which was a pond created from the overflow of the water tanks. I then opened two widows looking towards the pond to give me a couple of shooting options depending on where the antelope decided to drink from.

The biggest of the four bucks was the first to get a drink and as he stepped to the edge of the pond I drew my bow. He was quartering to me, but he had his onside leg forward enough I felt good about the shot. At the shot I knew it hit where I wanted and the buck went about 50 yards and piled up as the three others stood around and tried to figure out what had just happened. Since I saw the buck go down I knew I could go out immediately and take pictures and take care of the meat before it got too hot out.

When I set up my blind for this hunt I set in to the south of where the antelope would be watering. I knew from past experience that they would drink from a pond if available rather than the stock tanks. Even though the winds the time of year seem to be mostly out of the south I feel like having the sun at my back is more important than having the right wind. The antelope don’t seem to completely circle the water before coming in and I think most of my scent is contained in the blind so I worry about them seeing me more than smelling me. With the sun at the back of the blind the antelope don’t seem to be able to see anything inside as I have got away with a lot of movement in there. In this setup I had to put the blind fairly close to the water since the pond was 30 yards across and there is no reason to take a longer shot than that with this kind of setup. In this hunt the antelope came into the side of the pond and I had a 23 yard shot.

Have a good one, and good luck!
-Ethan Starck