Fees to Hunt Sheep Pay for Conservation
sold for $ 480,000, still a record. The result was a large ram, and hundreds of thousands of dollars that went into the budget of Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks.
“As far as sheep-hunting being a rich man’s sport, that’s absolutely true,” said Vance Corrigan, 84, who lives in Montana and is one of the most accomplished big-game hunters in the world. “But if it weren’t for the rich man, those sheep wouldn’t be there.”
Non- hunters often presume that the biggest prize in North America is something large and fierce — some kind of bear or a mountain lion. But serious hunters believe that rams are the ultimate pursuit.
That is for two reasons. One, opportunities to hunt sheep are scarce, and often prohibitively expensive. Two, the hunts are among the most difficult, often lasting weeks in remote regions.
“For 100 years, it’s been somewhat at the pinnacle of big-game hunting, especially in the United States,” said Bob Anderson, a hunter and author of books on sheep-hunting. “Now it’s become a cocktail party of sorts.”
At the Wild Sheep Foundation’s convention each January, single hunting permits from various states, provinces and Indian reservations are auctioned off to the highest bidders. Most go for well more than $100,000.
“People who pay $ 300,000 for a tag, they just paid to recover 30 sheep to places that haven’t had sheep in 100 years,” Mr. Corrigan said.
Some have estimated that there were millions of wild sheep in North America 200 years ago. But by the 1950s, squeezed out by people and decimated by diseases, the population dwindled into the tens of thousands. Conservation efforts saved the sheep and have expanded their territory. There are now nearly 200,000 wild sheep in North America.
The United States Fish and Wildlife Service estimates that there are more than 10 million big-game hunters in the United States. But only about 2,500 wild sheep are hunted each year across North America.
Generally, there are two ways to hunt wild sheep. One is hunting’s version of the lottery — pay a few dollars and apply for one of the limited number of licenses that are raffled off.
The second way is to spend a lot of money. While residents generally can hunt sheep within their own state, province or territory, nonresidents are required to hire a registered outfitter. The laws of supply and demand push the price of hunting the sheep to between $25,000 and $50,000 in the United States. Hunts in Mexico can reach $100,000.
A wealthy few go beyond that. They bid on exclusive permits that are auctioned off annually to raise money for states, provinces and Indian reservations, seeing their lavish spending as a charitable donation, a tax write- off and a chance to capture one of hunting’s premier trophies. What they are not buying is an easy trophy.
“You have to climb the mountain. The fat, rich guy is going to have a much harder time,” said Lance Kronberger, who owns Freelance Outdoor Adventures in Alaska and guides big-game hunts of all kinds. “Anybody can kill a bear if they sit on the beach or along the stream long enough. I could take a guy in a wheelchair and get him a bear. You can go and get your deer, get your elk. You can’t do that with sheep. You have to go and get it.”
Mr. Burns sat in a ballroom in Reno, Nevada. It was a Friday in January, and there were about 1,000 people sitting at 100 round tables, having just eaten the one entree offered: steak.
On stage was an auctioneer. The next item for bid, Number 15, was the California Desert Bighorn Sheep Permit.
Mr. Burns wears few signs that he is a world- class hunter or an executive for KUIU, a fast-growing gear and apparel company. He held his phone to his ear. The voice on the other side belonged to Jason Hairston, KUIU’s 45-year- old founder.
Mr. Hairston wanted the California permit. A year earlier, he was the last one to drop out of the bidding.
The night of the auction was the day of the presidential inauguration, and Mr. Hairston was in Washington at an inaugural ball. He handed the phone to his wife, Kirstyn. Afraid that her husband might drop out and be left disappointed again, she wanted to do the bidding through Mr. Burns.
The auctioneer opened the bidding at $100,000. Four other bidders quickly took the tag to $135,000. The price nudged up until it was Mr. Burns and one other bidder who kept ratcheting the price further. Mr. Burns nodded to $235,000, there was no response. The tag, going once, going twice, was sold. Mr. Burns ended the call.
“There are no guarantees,” Mr. Hairston said. “The hunt starts November 1.”
Whether he gets a ram or not, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife receives 95 percent of the auction price — in this case, a record $223,250. That is fed into a general big-game budget of about $10 million. The money pays for sheep- specific employees and conservation efforts, like helicopter surveys and captures to test the animals for disease and collar them to track their health and movements.
Combined, the auction of about 30 permits over three nights in Reno raises about $ 3 million annually. The Wild Sheep Foundation adds money to that total and, last year, gave about $ 4.7 million to conserva- tion efforts.
But the conservation efforts have created a dilemma. Sheep numbers are on the rise, leading some states to raise the number of permits available through the lotteries. In turn, more hunters can increase competition for top rams, which can lower the price of an auction tag, thus hurting the budgets of those involved in conservation.
“There’s some fear,” Mr. Anderson, the historian, said, “that sheep hunting will strangle on its success.”
In 2012, a friend sent Mr. Burns a photograph of a ram he had seen in the Bob Marshall Wilderness, more than 400,000 hectares of forest and granite. Mr. Burns made the photo his screen saver and the ram his quest.
Mr. Burns has assisted on many hunts, but could not afford to buy a tag at auction. For years, he applied for tags through the lottery system, to no avail. His name was drawn in 2015. That fall, Mr. Burns spent 22 days wandering the Bob, as it is called, carrying a bow and searching for his sheep. He figures he walked about 240 kilometers.
He found his ram on Day 23. He called the friend who first spotted the ram and asked him to come. The friend hiked 10 hours overnight to be there.
That morning, Mr. Burns silently slipped himself into position, looking for the right angle. He managed to get closer, but the herd smelled him, shuffled away and settled again. Mr. Burns positioned himself within about 70 meters.
The arrow pierced the ram behind the front shoulder. It ran about 90 meters, dropped and died. Mr. Burns and his friend skinned and cleaned the animal. They packed out nearly 45 kilograms of meat, about 20 kilograms of the skull and horns, and the sheep’s full cape.
The ram was 13½ years old. Its horns, measured with a formula that combines length and mass, scored 189⅝, believed to be the biggest ram killed by a bow in North America that year. At the Wild Sheep Foundation’s show in Reno, Mr. Burns won the award for “top archery bighorn,” proclaimed on a big belt buckle.
A few months after the hunt, several kilos of the ram’s meat sizzled on the backyard barbecue, and the skull and massive horns sat on a garage workbench. Mr. Burns figured he would someday get it mounted, but said that the prize was the memory, not the trophy.
“It was the greatest hunt of my life,” he said. “Every time I see him, I smile.”