Selah Butte Ram

[soccerguy]

Well I'm done with the hunt and pictures of the ram are attched.  I only hunted for three days and did not pay the $1500 fee demanded by Red's/Eaton.  My experience was that there were numerous rams on the public land along the river in two areas.  One we nicknamed the "Bald Mtn" area was a narrow band just west of Bald Mtn all the way to the Yakima River.  This area was very steep and had more vertical distance (maybe 2000' to the top from the highway) than the area further north, but we saw lots of rams there...just never that I would call a shooter since my goal was something close to a 160 ram.  The area to the north had quite a bit of huntable public land and we also saw a lot of rams in that area.

A lot of the mature rams in this unit seem to be somewhere in the 150's...either because they do not have the mass, horn length, or other qualities.  In three days hunting, we probably saw at least 10-15 per day in this category...a lot of them being in the low 150's.  All of these rams were on public ground, some of them were a long way up vertically but after all, it is sheep hunting isn't it??

The third day of the hunt, we spotted a couple of potential shooters about 1200 feet above the highway.  They walked over the top of the ridge out of sight so we decided to climb up and take a closer look.  After a rather interesting climb, we topped out and, of course, couldn't find them.  We did locate some other rams but they weren't shooters, so back down to the road we went.  Driving down the road only another mile or so, we located another ram on the side of the hill much lower than than the original two "shooters" and he looked bigger!  So, friend Eric and I climbed up the hill far enough to be within shooting range and I was able to make the shot...with help from friend Steve spotting from the road and waving arm signals.

His estimated score is 162-163.  He's a chocolate color and I'm very happy with him.

[clindsayrun]

Awesome that you found him on public land. I wouldn't have paid either...

[Boss .300 winmag]

Nice ram, good on you for not paying extortion fee.

[carpsniperg2]

Congrats, I was hoping you would find your ram

[ellensburgpo]

Nice ram, good on you for not paying extortion fee.

 

[cem3434]

Congrats on a nice looking ram.  Hopefully you can help out other members that draw this tag in the future, so they can avoid paying the fee as well. 

[singleshot12]

Oh man I bet you're happy, nice ram , I'm pretty sure I saw that same ram while chuker hunting, he was with two others similiar in size.

[elkoholic1]

 

[soccerguy]

Congrats on a nice looking ram.  Hopefully you can help out other members that draw this tag in the future, so they can avoid paying the fee as well. 

I will be more than happy to help any way I can.  I did a lot of public land map research and can pinpoint the public areas very well.  One annoying thing was the "Eaton Ranches" signs posted on what was obviously public ground...I totally ignored them and used my map info instead.

[fishngamereaper]

  Nice ram...thats the quality I like to see coming from that area...crossing my fingers while I still have two good legs.

[carpsniperg2]

 You should call that in. It is illegal to post land that does not belong to you. If they have their sign on it then they can get into trouble for that.

[MLBowhunting]

Great job and a awesome ram

[NWWA Hunter]

That's awesome

[Ridgerunner]

Great looking ram,way to hold out for what you wanted.

[JLS]

Gorgeous sheep!