I hope this message finds you well and that your Holidays were full of joy. I especially hope that you had a very successful hunting season. I didn’t draw any special permits this year so I put all of my backcountry time into chasing elk in the Selway Bitterroot wilderness. We had some great opportunities to get an elk during bow season, but I was unable to get a shot. I spent many days filled with quality time with my hunting partners in some of the wildest country in the lower 48 states. Even though we didn’t bag an elk during our hunts I am reminded that the pursuit is 99 percent of why I love to hunt. Our success was found in camaraderie, in the communing with God’s unblighted wilderness and our safe return to our families.

As a Montana Wild Sheep Foundation (MTWSF) board member I have to remind myself that our successes as a chapter have to be measured in our journey as well. As our fundraiser and banquet approaches on February 28th and 29th I am reminded that MTWSF is building funds so that our chapter will be prepared when a land purchase or wild sheep transplant opportunity arises. Know that we are working to accomplish both of those things in the near future and those two projects will take a substantial amount of resources to accomplish.

MTWSF is continuing to reach out to the Montana legislature and Montana Fish Wildlife and Parks (MTFWP) with other collaborative stakeholders to push for new transplants of wild sheep into approved areas where risk is at a minimum. Our chapter is also working to help purchase more strategic properties that will enhance habitat and public access in perpetuity. Make sure to go to our website and purchase a ticket to the fundraiser and banquet on February 28th and 29th at the Billings Convention Center and Hotel https://MTWSF2020.givesmart.com. This event will help us all build memories and resources to accomplish the objectives our chapter has set to achieve.

Shane Clouse
Montana Wild Sheep Foundation President
shane@shaneclouse.com

Time and Effort Pay Off

Story by: Riley Pearson

I grew up in Western Montana, about 30 miles east of Missoula near a place that some sheep enthusiasts may have heard of. The Fall seasons of my childhood and high school were spent hunting deer and elk on the slopes above Rock Creek, mediocre hunting for my quarry, but famed for Bighorn Sheep. I would see them, some of them very large – often. They would rut on the hillside above the house and occasionally slam heads in the yard. I was just a kid when Jim Weatherly killed the largest Bighorn Ram ever taken by a hunter in the world (at that time).

In what must have been 2000 or 2001, young me was on Babcock Mountain with my mother, who had drawn a 210 Mule Deer buck tag. As we sat silently in the snow, a group of bighorns came right up to us. I remember it like it was yesterday.

Read the whole article in our WildSheep Newsletter, Winter 2020.

Inspiring Youth

Story by: Ryan Brock, Wild Sheep Foundation

The Wild Sheep Foundation (WSF) is in its eighth year of having a Shooting, Hunting and Ethics Education Program, or S.H.E.E.P. as it is often referred to as. The goal of the youth program is to get kids passionate about the outdoors through conservation, hunting, the shooting sports, and just excitement about nature.

The program has taken off since its early years, when the first three years saw us impacting just over 3000, 4500, and then 8300 kids. In fact, of the last six years of impacting kids, WSF has seen participation increase an average of 41% a year. Last year we were involved in 76 events in one way or another, impacting 23,908 young minds.

Read the whole article in our WildSheep Newsletter, Winter 2020.