Full Curl

The thing about having hunting goals, is that they have to require some level of difficulty to achieve. This may take the form of a Physically testing experience, financial costs or simply the slow passage of time. Years of walking up and down valleys, exploring different road ends, E-scouting and research, just to improve the chances of coming across that animal. It might be a 14inch bull tahr plodding through the snow on some distant ridge. Or a 10inch Chamois buck hid away in some remote tussock basin. I have more hunting goals then I can count, the afore mentioned included. But one ive been enamoured with for a long time has been a feral sheep. More specifically a Wild ram with furl curled horns or greater, a shaggy remnant of the old Spanish breeds.

It may not sound like much, paling in comparison to the sledgehammers carried by Canadian Stone sheep or elegantly twisting horns of Mongolian Argali. New Zealand’s feral sheep have little to offer as far as majestic qualities but there is something about them. Totally unlike modern breeds, they are stocky and adaptable. Most hunters will have seen the photos or watched the you tube videos of Pitt Island Rams and Arapawa sheep of private hunting blocks. Not many really know about the scattered public land herds sparsely populating select regions of the North and South Islands. Through research and a good deal of circumstantial luck I managed to come across one of these herds. My dream had suddenly become a reality, somewhere within the kanuka forest and tussock faces, A big wild ram was hiding.

A year of occasional visits, disciplined glassing and many wild sheep had led to this day as Me and Kim-My canine morale support- locked the last door of the truck. My left hand gripped my bow as my right fumbled my Camera and tripod. A public land, archery wild ram hunt is an adventure worth filming and a story worth telling. As is typical for me, our march began at the hottest part of the day. Kim likely cursed my planning skills as her tongue lolled in the searing heat. I looked at my bow as I panted my way up the mountain. Readers and watchers of my content will know my affinity for the recurve bow. In the last couple months, I had decided to at least try my hand at the whole compound thing and quickly learned to love it. The speed, power and consistency of a high-tech bow became irresistible to shoot. Id be lying if I didn’t admit that part of the joy was that it made hunting easier. The 20-yard ethical range of a recurve compared to the 60 of a compound is very attractive. Combine the fact that I’m self-filming every one of my hunts makes the mission of trying to down big game animals with a recurve and get it on camera, a more than difficult undertaking.

Kim padded to the edge of a massive series of gullies and faces. Golden tussock clambered up the steep slopes and dark manuka forests weaved the landscape together below. That big ram was waiting. The hunt began. I worked my way down a prominent ridge, glassing on either side and across as I went. Nothing yet. No matter, its still hot and any sheep are likely still bedded or at least grazing further down in the shadowy green corners of these dry hills. The hours whizzed past as they always do. A distant ewe, a mob here, a mob there. Talking to a camera like I’m going insane. Maybe I am. This is public land, could there even be a mature wild ram here? Everything probably gets shot at the age of two. Eventually Kim and I made it to the river at the furthest corner of the block. A mob of hoggets and ewes scampered up the bank. The wind was less than ideal so I made the call to push up the side, and then drop down onto a clearing I could see on the topo map, with the wind in my favour. The stalk was slow, bone dry kanuka branches snapped and cracked loudly. Kim padded Infront, effortlessly avoiding every noisy plant thing that I seemed to step on. The clearing was just ahead, I could hear the calls of sheep already in the meadow. Time to slow it down. My pack slid to the ground; I could come back for it. The meadow loomed brightly ahead. The kanuka and manuka made a dark canopy and shrouded me in darkness. I peered through a window in the trees. Half a dozen sheep scattered at all ends. The wind was perfect, but no ram.

Suddenly at the far end of the meadow, the incessant bleating of a big old ewe, separated from the herd. She bounded on the rocks in a surprisingly graceful manner. Wait a minute…Holy crap! That thing has Horns. It’s a ram! The rams’ golden horns arched back and whipped round in a full curl. Shrinking back into the shadows, I could imagine the weight of the horns, feel the annuli. The ram was on the move and getting closer. Less than 100 yards he stood broadside in the early evening light. If I had a rifle, he would have been dead on the spot, but the only thing I was shooting him with was my camera. A Ewe a appeared Infront of him and he stopped his loud calling. Poor guy didn’t want to get left behind I thought. Now the waiting game ensued. The wind was good enough. The ram and his now small mob of ewes we grazing slowly back the way he’d come from. The biggest danger was the ewes. The ram seemed reasonably oblivious but the ewes were ever vigilant. Kim stayed in the trees as I began my stalk, crab walking and crawling through the open grass, I had almost no cover, only clumps of tussocks and ankle high rocks. I slid my bow Infront of me and continued my army crawl. I ranged him, 35 yards. I was closer than I needed to be. Carbon slid onto the string; my arrowhead glinted in the evening light as I calmed myself. Months of practice and searching had led to this moment. I raised up, levelling the bow as I kneeled comfortably. The orange veins of the arrow disappeared into the woollen hide of the sheep. He twitched and pranced a few paces. I looked down to knock another arrow, but found him totally gone when I looked up. I sighed triumphantly as the tension left my body. My hands hugged the sweat of my face and I chuckled. Hell yes.

I forced myself to wait 27minutes back in the shadows of the trees with Kim. The intensity of Bowhunting is much like a drug, had I been using a rifle I don’t think it would’ve felt earned. Bowhunting is so personal, so up close and risky. Success is so few and far between but yet I always hesitate to pick up a rifle recreationally. It seems like a betrayal, like a contradiction to my own self pondered reasons for hunting. Mind you, my recurve bow had gathered dust for the last few months. What the hell is this challenge or sporting malarkey hunters obsess over. Give me 600 hectares of gorse and a single goat to find. Isn’t that the ultimate challenge? But that’s 'too' hard. In so many ways my challenge recently had become filming, perfecting the way the story is being told, learning how my gear works, being creative and more than anything filming the stalk in all its glory. It’s harder than you’d think. Kim lapped water out of her canvas bowl, breaking the tension of my pondering.

I did not and still haven’t found that ram. Hours of tracking up and down spurs and another trip into the same areas two weeks later. I put Kim put through her paces to find a needle in a haystack. Reviewing footage, it appears my arrow had been further back than intended. The arrow snaked into the grass and not a drop of blood was found. The vitals of a wild sheep, especially with a gut full of grass are small and far forward. In contrast since then I have taken several ewes that only made it 10 meters with good shot placement. To fatally wound an animal and never recover it is the dark side of hunting. Known most intimately by bowhunters. So, I guess the hunt will not cease for that big full curl ram, though I can’t shake the feeling that I’ve lost my chance. The ram meant for me, my ram, lies somewhere in the kanuka forest, melting back into the ground that sustained him for his exceptionally long life. In a way he is a greater trophy in that sense. A cautionary tale, a lesson, the wisdom of preparation and practice. To strive to better thyself and most importantly, that the challenge must never be over.