The Mountain Will Speak

The mountains aren’t getting taller or steeper, but with each passing year it feels that way.

By Craig Boddington – Excerpt from Wild Sheep Magazine

“The mountain will tell me,” says legendary sheep hunter Rex Baker. Rex is a decade my senior. Recently, he confided to me that the mountain was starting to whisper, hadn’t yet blocked his trail. Couple years ago, Alan Sackman decided it would be fun to take one more FNAWS…in his 80s. He set to work and accomplished his goal. Early this year, I sat next to Dr. Gerald Warnock at the Weatherby banquet. He was excited that he was headed to Mexico for a desert ram. At our Sheep Show I talked to his outfitter, Bo Morgan. Yes, Jerry Warnock took a fine ram…at 91.

These guys are all Weatherby award winners, Baker in 2002, Sackman in 2008, Warnock clear back in 1994. At that moment in their careers all were highly experienced mountain hunters…by definition for that award. Years later, and years older, they’re still at it, still testing themselves, listening for the mountain’s message. Now past 70, so am I. To see guys like these, with more years under their belts, still making it up the mountains, gives me hope that I might have a few climbs left in me.

 

A YOUNG HUNTER’S GAME?

I hear it all the time: Mountain hunting is for young folks. I’m not sure that’s true. The toughest hunts are probably easiest when we’re young. In peak condition and prime of life, we don’t even realize it’s supposed to be hard. Nor do we care. We have little caution, always in a hurry. On the other hand, even for the young the first mountain hunt might be the most difficult of all. We don’t know what to expect, how hard we must push ourselves.
 
Doesn’t get easier, but experience counts. With enough ascents, we know how bad it can get. The mountain has no surprises left to throw at us. We know how steep, how poor the footing, how miserable the weather can be. We also know something a young hunter cannot know: We know what we are capable of, and that we want it badly enough. We are compelled to keep doing it as long as we can. Until the mountain speaks and tells us we are done.

There’s also practical reality. Mountain hunting is not the world’s least costly hobby. With careers to pursue and children to raise, few young hunters have the means. Even for those who do, most sheep hunts are serious expeditions, minimum couple weeks. Also tough for hunters with young families and increasing responsibilities at home and at work. Regardless of location, much more time-consuming than a weekend’s deer hunt.

 
Here in North America, we have the wonderful luxury of drawing for permits. Plus, millions of acres of public and crown land where we can use them. We all know fortunate hunters who drew the first time he or she applied. Further practical reality, however, is that drawing a sheep or goat tag takes years and an ever-increasing number of points. I never drew a great tag first time around, but I was only three years in the draw to my Montana bighorn permit, almost the same as first-year. I was 30 years to my Arizona sheep tag, also 30 years to my Montana goat tag. This is my 46th year applying for sheep in Nevada, since long before bonus points existed. An eternal optimist, I still believe I will draw that permit…while I’m able to do the hunt.
 
Add up all the practical realities and maybe mountain hunting isn’t altogether a young hunter’s game. For sure, a magnificent ram is something we should aspire to and dream of, but it’s not the end of the world if we put it off until the kids are out of school, more time available, the finances more secure. More power to you if you can start at a younger age, but no shame if you can’t. The mountain will be there, waiting for you.
 
Easy for me to say, right? I was 20 when I shot my first wild sheep. BC outfitter Nathan Olmsted joined us at my kids’ Texas ranch last night. He was 11 when he shot his first ram. We were fortunate, but we started sheep hunting in a different era…that ended not so long ago. Today, with permits ever tougher to draw and costs continuing to escalate, a sheep hunt may be years in the planning. I have multiple friends in their 40s and 50s, highly experienced hunters, who are just now contemplating a first sheep hunt.

 

Pinned down! Jordan Wallace and Dave Leonard hunkered down, hoping some rams move into a better position before it gets dark.

 
That’s not a problem. In fact, a great age to begin sheep hunting. Young enough to conquer mountains, old enough to have acquired a bit of wisdom, a modicum of caution, and enough of life to savor the experience. With luck, plenty of years left to savor it again and again. My friend Jim Manley, just a couple years older, was 52 when he did his first sheep hunt. Many since. He got sheep fever bad. In 2022, at 73, he took a fine Dall’s ram in the rough, tough Chugach range. Fine enough to win him membership in the elite “700 Club,” a distinction most of us (me included) will not achieve at any age.
 

BODY IN MOTION

Inertia is Sir Isaac Newton’s First Law of Motion: “A body at rest will remain at rest, and a body in motion will remain in motion unless it is acted upon by an external force.” A couch potato is likely to stay a couch potato. A professional athlete is likely to continue training through the off season—and deep into retirement—because maintaining skills is part of who he or she is. Make no mistake, a mountain hunter is a special and different sort of athlete.
 
Our “events” are usually scheduled some time out. Naturally, we step up our training to prepare for a big game, but most of us maintain moderate sheep-shape as a matter of long habit and lifestyle…and just in case there’s a last-minute opportunity. I asked Nate Olmsted about the oldest sheep hunter he had guided. Not too far back he guided an 84-year-old to a fine Stone’s ram, his final sheep hunt. Interestingly, this gent had taken his first ram at 17, way back in that different era. That’s a 67-year career as a mountain hunter. He was a body in motion.
 
Once you know what is required, it’s easier to maintain a modest level of conditioning. Because you know what you must do, and you also know it’s hell to start over. That said, life throws you some curves. Anyone who’s had one can attest that a heart attack is a life-changing event, requiring a restart. Likewise, I suppose, any other life-threatening illness that we manage to survive. In that restart, depression, fear, and anger at our bodies for failing us are normal emotions.
 
I went through all that after my heart attack, restarted slow, worked my way up. In large measure because I wanted to get back in the mountains. Four months out of the hospital I did a walk-up tahr hunt in New Zealand. Note that some mountain hunts are tougher than others. This was fairly gentle country. Took my time, felt pretty good.
 
   

 

LEFT/TOP: Mountains vary. This is the Caucasus range in Azerbaijan, not terribly high, but some of the steepest, most abrupt mountains in the world. RIGHT/BOTTOM: A good Kuban tur, taken in southern Russia…eight months after Boddington had a heart attack. He figured if he could handle the Caucasus he could handle anything. Since then, no further problems.

At the eight-month mark, my graduation exercise was a tur hunt in Russia’s Caucasus range. That is not gentle country. Not especially high, ridiculously steep. I figured if I could handle that, I should be good to go. Have been ever since. 

We all age differently, and we all have different health issues that, naturally, tend to increase as we grow older. Downright foolish to consider a mountain hunt without having a heart-to-heart with your doctor…and yourself. Embarking on a mountain hunt is not an exam you can cram for. There are all manner of great fitness and training programs out there, but I’m not the guy to talk to about that. My uncle, Art Popham, was one of the early guys to complete a FNAWS. No fitness freak, for sure. He was an attorney, office on the top floor of a high-rise. In preparation for mountain hunts, he simply used the stairs instead of the elevator.
 
 

 
LEFT/TOP: There are many good fitness and training programs. Boddington believes walking is the best preparation for mountain hunting, especially if you can find trails that offer a lot of up-and-down. RIGHT/BOTTOM: On the way out with a load of sheep meat.

I am also not a fitness freak. Into my 50s, the Marines kept me in pretty good shape because passing the Physical Fitness Test was an annual requirement. After retirement, I lost that incentive, more’s the pity, but I’m determined to remain a body in motion. When home, I go to the gym consistently, hate it, make myself do it. Although never serious, I was long a runner, part of the Marine thing. Knees won’t put up with that silliness anymore, so I jog slowly at an aggravatingly slow old man’s pace—or just walk. I remain convinced that the best exercise for walking is just that: Walking. We have good hiking trails in our area, no elevation, but plenty of up and down. Absent hills, there are always stadium steps.
 

AT YOUR PACE

Essential to do plenty of walking in your boots and add a little weight. Although it’s important to do the best you can—different for each of us—to train for a mountain hunt, I’m not sure it’s possible to be a hundred-percent ready. Footing will be different, probably unfamiliar. For those of us who live in low country (me included), altitude effects are inconsistent. Despite advancing age and physical limitations, most of us get through it and keep coming back for more because of two important factors.

First, mountain hunting is largely mental. Sheer will is a determining factor. You gotta want it bad enough. We’ll come back to that. Second, mountain hunting is not a race. Doesn’t matter how slow you are, only matters that you get there.

 
Also sounds easy to say, right? Yes, but slow and steady is the essence of mountain hunting. No points awarded for getting to the top first, only for getting there. Few mountain animals are taken in early morning. That’s when we’re climbing our way up to them, slowly but surely. The hope, always, is to reach vantage points, glass animals feeding and moving, put them to bed. Then we have all day to move on them. Slowly but surely, at our own pace.
 
In my experience, the daily schedule of sheep and goats is ideal for calm, deliberate, methodical hunting. Mountain animals are highly crepuscular, most active early morning and late afternoon, usually bedding and ruminating for long midday periods. They move little at night. Neither do mountain hunters, dangerous for everything up in the rocks in the dark.


 

Sheep camp in Alaska’s Brooks Range. When leaving camp for a day’s hunt, assume you aren’t coming back that night, so take everything needed to survive for a day or two.

In northern latitudes, with long daylight, one might have shooting light for 20 hours or more. That’s not a pace anyone can hold, so morning hunts are often abandoned. Sleep in, get rested, saddle up or pick up packs in the late morning, head up and get on the glasses, hoping to find animals moving to bedding grounds or already bedded. If the latter, you have time to move on them…at your own pace. They aren’t always approachable, but are likely to come down in the late afternoon, for water, feed, or both.
 
Some of my sheep and goats have been taken in their beds in midday hours. More have been taken in the late afternoon, often by waiting them out. This doesn’t always work. At some point you must get down out of the rocks, so almost none of my mountain animals have been taken in last-light situations so common with hunting antlered game and bears. However, sheep and goats you leave at sunset probably won’t move far during the night. Now you have decisions, based somewhat on weather and mobility. Back to camp, and do it all again the next day, or stay on the mountain and plan a dawn ambush.

I don’t carry as much stuff as I used to and have much less shame about accepting help. Doesn’t matter to the sheep if you stubbornly insist on carrying all your own gear or allow your horse or strong young guide to carry a heavier burden. What does matter: When leaving camp in the morning, figure you aren’t coming back that night, so have everything you need, including a bit of food, to stay warm enough and dry enough through a long night on the mountain. 
 

MIND OVER MATTER

Remember my favorite mountain message? “The mountain doesn’t mind, and you don’t matter.” Absent major infirmities—even with them—age is just a number. It’s sheer will and mental toughness that put sheep and goats in the salt. On almost any day on a mountain hunt there will be times when you’ll want to quit, wonder why in the world you are doing this to yourself. Those who succumb to the temptation are not mountain hunters, and unlikely to become mountain hunters. It’s supposed to be hard, it’s supposed to hurt. The trick lies in not minding that, wanting it bad enough.

Mountain hunting is not for everyone, nor does it need to be. No shame in not wanting it bad enough. Doesn’t mean you aren’t a hunter; just means you aren’t a mountain hunter. If you are, then you want to keep doing it as long as you can.

 
Determination—and experience—add years to legs, but common sense should be applied. Mountains are not created equal, nor are mountain hunts (or mountain hunters). I did several backpack sheep hunts in my 60s. I’d probably need to think about that today. A couple years ago I finally drew a Montana goat tag. I didn’t know the area I drew, so I called Jack Atcheson Jr. for a recommendation. He suggested Ryan Counts, a great horse outfitter. Then he said, “The older I get, the more I like horses.” That goat area was high and rough. God bless horses!

 
   

LEFT/TOP: Jack Atcheson Jr., headed up into one of Montana’s “unlimited bighorn” zones with a full pack. 30 years later, he says “the older I get, the more I like horses.” RIGHT/BOTTOM: Montana horse outfitter Ryan Counts glassing while the horses take a break. Horses save a lot of steps, a good option for older hunters.

Mountains vary, too. I trained hard and diligently for those backpack sheep hunts. Also, by design, I went to Alaska’s Brooks Range, neither high nor abrupt. Had no trouble. I’ve admitted that I’m not a fitness freak. Holiday season is hard on everyone, but that time of year I get especially lazy. Starts with post-Thanksgiving Kansas rifle season. Stand-hunting for whitetails is not conducive to staying sheep-shape. Then comes convention season, almost impossible to keep a workout regimen.
 
Two years ago, I got caught with a last-minute opportunity to join a group on an ibex hunt in Tajikistan…in late February. Just after convention season, I’m not likely to be in great shape. That year was worse than most, spent a week in bed with Covid. Of course, it never occurred to me to say no. The Pamirs in eastern Tajikistan are very high (Roof of the World), but not especially steep. I know that area, didn’t know the mountains in central Tajikistan. Not as high but very steep. Didn’t make me feel better that my camp-mates were all decades younger.
 
Experience does count. One morning I saw a huge ibex up high in the middle of nowhere. I don’t know if any of my younger friends could have gotten to that ibex or not; I only know he was beyond my reach. Next day, I had a shot at a lovely ibex. Midway through the hunt, lots of time. Maybe I’d have gotten a bigger one if I’d held out. Maybe not, impossible to know. I was doing fine, moving at my own pace. Feeling the country, recognizing that, age aside, I wasn’t in shape for it. Never even occurred to me to pass the shot. It did occur to me that I’d better not miss. I didn’t. 

 
Doesn’t matter how long it take you to get there, only that you get there. Nice ibex from central Tajikistan, 2022. 

None of us can know how much time we have, or how long we can keep climbing. If I should live that long, I don’t know that I’ll still be hunting the mountains in my 80s, highly unlikely in my 90s. I do know that I’m not quite done. The mountain is speaking to me, but its message is not that it’s time to quit. Instead, it’s calling me. Right now, unusually, I have no mountain hunts planned. Maybe wait until the permit drawings come out, then make a plan. I’m feeling lucky this year