They told us a few people have been able to get a Barbary Sheep with a high-powered rifle at long range. They said odds were against us and there was no way to get close enough to put the Excalibur to work. They said we could spend a month and not see any. They said is we walked up the mountain we'd disturb them and they'd be gone. We went anyway. Even though would have one hunter the other 3 of us could be important for dealing with anything that comes up when your cell phone doesn't work and it's an hour drive to get back to the pavement.
When we got there we found the maintenance house that has some beds, two bathrooms and a generator for electricity. From there, we could watch the peak and the trails running down from it with a spotting scope and binoculars. We got lucky, we spotted a small group of Aoudad on the first evening right at dark. The next day we split up. My Dad found a few walking down on a main trail just as the sun came up. My brothers and I found a group in the bottom of a canyon far away and possibly on someone else's property. None of them seemed that big anyway. We did not see any on the next day or night. The following day we all saw some in different spots. My Dad saw what he thought was a big one. It popped up over a peak for a second and then hours later it came out on a ledge. Later, it looked like the same one was on top of the two spots he was seen, kind of making a triangle.
My Dad figured it was only a mile away. He left the maintenance house in the middle of the night. His plan was to move up there and sleep in the Aoudad's backyard. He told me to watch my phone for text, which seemed to work even though the phone signal did not. If the big ram was going to do what he had, he would come down to an intersection of trails and be there about 8AM. My Dad said when the sun came up he was a little off his mark and could not see the trails to the right. He could see in front, and a trail angling in from the left and one 90 degrees to the left. There's a little pocket where the trails meet that will put an animal within 30-yards in about a 60 foot by 100 foot window.
My Dad said his head when hanging to the left as he opened his eyes. In just seconds a giant ram appeared. It did not come in on any of the trails we found but on a small ancillary "trail" that was just a worn path about 6-inches wide. Also, it was only 7:16AM. Dad says he knew immediately this was a big one due to the mane and chaps flowing off of it and the fact that it was alone. He eased the M380 up while the ram was stopped just to the left. The ram took one more step and turned his head staring towards my Dad. We believe in the HECS technology - a carbon fiber grip that uses the Faraday Cage principle to block human electrical output. Animals might know you're there but they can't figure out what you are. Dad said the ram looked puzzled and was staring hard trying to figure out what this thing was. He found the money spot in the Leupold scope and sent the BEZS with a InnerLock 150 grain 3-blade toward the ram. The shot ended up just 18-yards! Dad said the noise from impact reminded him of stopping on an empty soda can.
I got a text. Get up. Start coming this way. Use binos, look for orange flag. I tried to wake my brothers but they weren't budging so I headed out. I ran until I couldn't and I climbed as fast as I could. It was a long time before I got there. My Dad hadn't moved an inch. We looked for the bolt and found it with the lighted knock on. Two blades of the InnerLock were broken off but the bolt was covered with blood. Dad told me the story quickly and I helped him find blood. The blood trail was pretty solid but it seemed like we went a long way. It is amazing that a big animal that's shot can go along such skinny, tough paths. It took us probably 15-minutes but there he was. He was already bloated even though it was just a few hours and only in around 60-degrees. The shot was true, severing the top of the heart and catching both lungs.
We cut the skin in front of the hips and peeled it forward, then separated the shoulders. This was our first load. We rigged up a way to both carry this. So we have the head and front legs and 3/4 of the skin all together. When we got down we weighed it and it was 116 pounds!. We made another trip where we took the backstraps and both hams and we packed a set each. The hams and backstraps were another 80-pounds. We took a long rest before my Dad caped the animal and then de-boned all the meat. It was 4PM before we got to the nearest town. The lady that took the meat to process weighed everything and looked at the horns and teeth. She said the ram was about 11-years old and likely 350 pounds live weight. She flash-froze the cape for us which took about 3 hours. It was a very long ride back but my brothers drove most of it. This is probably our greatest crossbow trophy so far!
