Dec 6 - Bighorn Sheep Watch

Today is the annual Bighorn Sheep Watch hosted by Utah's  Division of Wildlife Resources. The watch is along an 8 mile stretch of dirt road along the Green River outside of Green River UT. During this time of year, the sheep are in rut and come down from the higher elevation which obviously makes for easier viewing. Also adding to the easier viewing, is the fact that sheep are simply pre-occupied with breeding and therefore less skiddish of people/cars.

I wanted to come to this last year but we were having snow and driving through the mountains in snow, was not worth the 3 hour drive for me.

I left Friday afternoon since the trip was leaving at 8am - if I left Sat, it would mean me driving at 5am on non-lit highway thru the mountains, with towns few and very far between - that's not high on my list of things do -- not to mention having to deal with 4 legged ungulates (deer, elk, moose) crossing the unlit roads.

The trip down was a breeze and the mesas and rock formations looked glowingly at dusk.

Cloudy Saturday morning and in the 40s - not bad. Lots of people (over 90) going on the trip. We met at the John Wesley Powell Museum in Green River. As we were herded up, the Lead DWR guy said that the last 2 weeks of Nov and 1st of Dec were always good viewing EXCEPT for this year. The unexpected record Nov warmth, for some reason, had cause the rut to occur 2 weeks earlier than normal and many of the sheep have headed back into the high country. He had said that on Monday, scouts reported 100 animals, Tues: 25, Fri: 4; so today would be tough going. Boo! But at least I would know where to go come next year. (yea!)

Since there were so many folks, I rode in the DNR SUV (just trying to save a car -- we had about a 30 car caravan). We were the trailing vehicle of the congo-line.

The road starts as paved and after about 6-7miles turns to dirt. The road is on the eastern edge of the Green River. Extremely pretty country even on a cloudy day.

It was a little hard to enjoy the scenery as my eyes were glued to the cliffs hoping to see a bighorn sheep that one of the 29 cars ahead of us somehow missed. Saw tons of rocks!!

Finally, the caravan stopped. A couple of us (including myself) got out to see what was up ahead. Success! Two sheep up a cliff. Everyone heads cranked looking upward. I asked many people where the sheep were but most had no clue but they were looking anyway. Someone finally tried to explain where the sheep were to me, but I couldn't find them.

Then one of the scout cars found 4 more further up the road so everyone packed up and headed on. Except my car; we moved up to where the 2 sheep were, got the spotting scope out and found them. I was actually able to find them with my binocs. A male and female, a few apart and both laying down looking at us, chewing their cud. Boy, do they blend into their surroundings.

After everyone had a look, we continued on. Our car decided that we would bypass the next 4 sheep (they were in the distance as well) and forge ahead in hopes of seeing some down low. And so we did and saw absolutely nothing but of course, more rocks.

Just before the road ends, we stopped at a petroglyph. A very nice one with deer, elk, and a snake.

Time to turn around and head back. We still had hopes that we would see something and we tried but nothing more. The sun did come out for just a bit.

Definitely not what anyone was expecting. But nature isn't predictable. I saw 2 sheep; that's cool. I call it a success!!

(On the way home, I saw 2 mule deer (doe) just outside of Spanish Fork).