ALASKA MOUNTAIN GOAT 2
And, they're, pretty much gonna have to make a move for us be able to do anything because I don't think we're gonna go if. There were anywhere they were yesterday. It's. About to get real. There. Are people in this world that go looking, for adventure, and then, there are those that live it everyday. Alaska. Outdoors, television. Experience. Alaska. Like never. Let's, go. You. Know I had a chance to. Winter. Ghost with Luke right. Well you know that winter goat hunt pretty, intriguing because you. Work your tail off to get up there so. You feel like you're earned it and then. We've. Got these critters up sitting up on top, way. About, looking. They're, looking for predators from below. And. They see a little bit better than we do. For. The. Rewards it comes from hard, work and. Being. Put, to. Take one more step up that mountain with a heavy pack on yeah. What do you what do you think stopper, uh goat. Or sheep I mean I certainly have my opinion I think that the, terrain. To. Go live in can. Be more. Challenging, in other words, you. Can find a goat that's, beautiful. But, you can't recover that goats they're just no way if you drop them nice and clean you'll never get to them or. If you don't drop them nice and clean he falls over the edge and you can't recover them and, I, think you find that to be more true with the goat hunt then. You do the sheep on yeah, and, so I think the approach on a sheep is more. Difficult. To. Do without getting busted. Whereas. I think that, the. Terrain can be more challenging, sometimes. Let it go. Packed. Up our gear for a sneek we pack for three nights for, the food and. Start. Hiking up the hill which. Took us about three hours to get up to the 1,500 foot level, which we've got about Jerome. And I think had about sixty to seventy pounds on our back and, we. Were just going, slow and. Join the sunny days - so I heard about Jerome and the, fact that he's kind of a mountain, ninja and the fact you the sheep, Slayer so I.
Figured. A guy that can get nine rounds before he's 30 years old is probably a guy I want to take on a winter, mountain goat hunt since it's never really done it before and try, to stack the odds in our favor with someone with the experience. Fortson. Enough to legal, my knight Ram. This, last fall. And. Everything. Every years all I think about, from. August, until, the. Day the end of the hunt is planning the next sheep hunt, something. I really enjoy doing mountain, goats come, close second, goat. Hunting is way. More extreme they, live in the nasty. Sheep. Only go there when you pressure them into it maybe bed in it once a while but goats seem to always be in it. Goats. Are in a more remote. Rugged. Area. That you have to take time and patience to let them come out of it pick a spot to where you could shoot it usually. A sheep you could buy clockwork get a man nice grass open fields when they're feeding goats. Tend to never leave the inaccessible. Craigs and when. They do you. Can't always shoot them because the recovery we. Were just hiking in the blind hoping we end up seeing him once we got up there and sure, enough right, about once we got to the levels we were play on a setting up spike camp we suppose aw about a dozen goat six hundred yards or so away, they. Were pretty spooky, and headed, for the top and, headed. Over to inaccessible country end. Up finding a Billie's lagging behind he, end up crossing, lower than the rest actually. Within 250. Yards inside, of that and. Presented. The thought opportunity, that I was able to take advantage of that. He's. A, three-year-old. Billy, not the biggest of the, bunch but for, a third-generation Alaskan, Luke, Moffat this, isn't his first time honey mountain goats on Kodiak Island. However. It, is his first time honey mountain goat in the dead of winter. Looking. At the rigs when they came out last June 30th. Noticed. That the, fishing. Game had extended the season for the Kodiak mountain goat hunt usually end December. 31st, but they extended it so. Not only March 20th they also made it from 1 goes to 2 due, to the overpopulation. That goes down here so just be. A good opportunity to come down here and get a little early start, to the hunting season. Really. The trophy for a goat more so than the horns to me is the hide so I tried to go October. Or later just, about any, time I can so the opportunity, and, I'm after they've pretty much put on as much hair as they possibly, can in March is a pretty. Neat opportunity, I definitely want to take advantage of that I was, contact. With me through social, media, we're always funding around since last September, about this winter goat hunt and things. Worked out right we were gonna plan for it come. December he gave me the call that he was gonna reserve everything, after if I was game and. As. Much as I like go hunting only. Chance to do it in the spring I jumped. Ship and came, down here, for. Luke it's, not just an opportunity to fill his freezer with meat but. More importantly, it's, an opportunity, to share his passion with someone else it's. Early in the day and we have really nowhere to be when I see it now the creek today we should be pretty little bone then. Get. The rest of the way back to tomorrow. Weeks love for hunting in the outdoors. Extends. A lot beyond, himself and so he. Is as excited. To get somebody else out there to do it as he is to do it himself, forget. What I'm paying this guy but I'm pretty sure he's. Worth. Luke. Loves to go and so of course, he's selective, about his hunting partners but, I also think you know just like with me when I was starting out if if somebody has an interest and you. Know any any kind of aptitude for it at all then who's gonna do anything in his power to try to encourage them to be successful. Being. Successful on a mountain goat hunt doesn't. Mean just tagging a goat. It. Also means knowing. The ropes to, surviving, in one of mother nature's toughest. Environments, big, progress. Fast. Progress but it's progress. So, when you're doing this you want to be really careful at, least with a Jetboil not to start with complete, snow you, start with like the bottom.
Third With one otherwise you'll mess, up that flux, ring on the bottom so I could ruin your day they'll still cook but not nearly as fast and I'd be nearly as efficient so, tech. Tip of the week. Push. Them in there tell. Me win. When. Next, morning woke up had a little bit of breakfast went. Behind, cam just to check her back. And, saw. Couple nannies bedding on a spot with, a couple kids so they're out of the question I think there's one to the left of the. Three dozen you know that's the kid in Aryan and Annie yeah they're right nanny I think has a kid on the left side of it I. Know. There was a lot more adults, in there with kids. 7:25. With, the angle at 690. Do. You think, they. Can get up through there look at that stuff. Walk. Towards us and we could be able to keep an eye on them pretty well from there. That's. When you want to make a play on. So. Me and Luke packed up for the day and climbed up to, the very top of the peaks and. Then we started Ridge walking. All. Over the place trying, to find out where where, the goats were hanging out. Finally. About three or four in the afternoon we, found out where but. It doesn't goats, were. But they were on the other side of the mountain which we. Could, not access with, our. Skill. Level or equipment, we had so end. Up not moving all day long so we had to climb back down to camp, empty-handed. In. Alaska's, backcountry one. Must never look past an opportunity, even, the Fox. Box. Old. Guy to you. You. Know what I've noticed is that goats seemed to be a little, more tolerant to and seeing, you and not. So quick to spook at least that's, what I've seen the. Hunts that I've been on a cheap, like, even. Get a glimpse, of you and. Game. Over to see oh yeah, and they're just in another range they'll go, no. Qualms, about going. Up that mountain over the edge and on, to the next Valley and just saying see you later we'll, come back to this valley in a month or next year or whenever or Never yeah, exactly but, those darn goats they like this they like to be right at the top of a knife, edge and, just run that rich back and forth back and forth no seems like you'd. Be hunting one side of the ridge you're wondering what's on the other side you finally get eclipsed on the other side it's like straight down craggy, rocks. The. Following day we. Woke, up after, of. A second night in spy camp and we were trying to debate on what we had to do we had one day of food left at that point we. Couldn't decide if we should go. Back up the ridge it was kind of foggy up there and we were afraid if we went all the way back to the top we wouldn't see anything anyway, or. If we should come back down and regroup and, at least get the one goat off the mountain and then the leaf spike camp and come back up with enough food to stay the duration. Yeah. We just call him to get a weather update is, for it yeah forecasted, for the next few days. Well. Thank you very much ma'am. Mmm. It, sounds like it's about. Like this until, Thursday. And there's a 50% chance of snow no high winds they're calling for anything like that so, that's positive. So. See. What see what Jerome wants to do I'm, down for anything really it's. A 50/50, crapshoot, I. Hate. Being a bum and not going after him but. The. One I'm ruining either right. With. The low visibility, and odds, stacked against them they. Decide to head back to the cabin to restock, their supplies and. Get Luke's goat off the mountain. Why. Why, pack it down honey, you like to gravity do it for you. This. Is like Olympic, curling at its best. I'm. Glad we didn't have them we are max. Brown. Sugar, and bourbon. Marinade. With, some onions salt garlic salt pepper olive. Oil. A little bit, of apple cider and. That's. Done it some heart ribs I'm. Gonna be tasty hello we're playing. Mashed. Potatoes chili. Go. Rebuild ribs. That's. A lot of eats right there, just. Like bamaca. All, done Jerome. Got. The smoky flavor and all. Right. Well here's to to tomorrow, right. Not. Too many times you get a pancake, on the Copeland. The. Goats were going over to this ball, right there they're. Just going back and forth and when we see them go out of sight I think they're just going into bed I mean. That's what it looks like to me anyway so the cabins here and we. You guys made it up to where yesterday. We. Climbed up to here to this Ridge probably, okay we went all the way down to the into here back. Up. To. Right here yeah just shy that doesn't look that far but it was brutal and and, so is this is, this the peak right here where they got it that this gorge where they got across for, us I think it's in our creek that we need to cross that looks about right right between them right now they're like right there so we're on the the crest of getting into being, shot again.
Damn. We, stock up on the goats on the way so. We jumped our bags down. That. Sign come, up here take a beat how, are our jars all played Billy as. We're getting at the base of the hill we softened goats into. A new area we originally. Couldn't access from spike. Camp because of the terrain so but we could from the bottom and they were only about, 1,500. Feet right, around there, we, made a play. Either. You know drop, the bags run up and try to get on these goats if, we were unsuccessful we're, just gonna go back up to the spike, camp for the rest of the trip. Okay. I'm recording whenever. You. Dropped one I think end. Up getting lucky got 400 yards from them made, a pretty good shot and. Dropped. The goat and a, pretty hairy little snow-covered. Valley, Strohm. Coming. Down off a. Hairy. Stuff. Just. I got a ways to go. As. You can see there's some blood. In the snow. That's, because it goat I can see just around the corner there. This. Part of these goats up here so. We've been hunting pretty hard so we figure we better Banzai, and. Not. Waste our chance with, the weather we've been having, and. Luckily. Caught up to this beautiful nanny, and. It's. All it wrote perfect. Got. Some beautiful hair more, important, than the horn size really. Don't like Judy nannies but this was first to meet time then. The quality of the hide hunt flashlight, horns and. Lastly horns but. She's gonna make a beautiful rug on my wall and give, us some fresh meat to get through the last of winter before the fish come in so. We call this trip a success, first. Add two, more goat tags so, guys, go pick up spike camp so we'll see what happens we end up not. And I have to spend another night at spike he actually, came right back to the cabin with that one got, to drag her down almost. To the bottom of the hill and made, for an easy pack out think there's only 700 yards to the cabin. Three. Hour go hot nice. Play. The beat feet to get up there though. Wow. 83-61. Nine. And a quarter. You. Can tell people you try mine inch winter goat on Kodiak. All. Right. The. Muscles are there should, be. I thought. It was a awesome. Trip the. Weather this, is the first time I spent a week on Kodiak and never had to wear. A raincoat so, I'll, probably never get to say that ever again but, I'll take it on this go-around winter. Time on Kodiak I don't. Think a lot of people just want to jump at that chance they'd, rather to save their time off and everything for a little. More balmy temperatures but we lucked out pretty well.
2020-02-13 02:26
