It is an extraordinary thing that though sheep so often turn and bolt downhill when merely frightened, a wounded ram, especially a big one, will struggle on higher and higher as long as life and the possibility of ascending lasts.
I have noticed the same habit in Caucasian tûr; but, of course, my experience may be exceptional.
Sheep rut in October, but the season varies somewhat in different localities, being a little later in some than in others. However, in a good sheep country the hunter may be pretty sure of hearing the hollow clang of the horns of fighting rams some time in October, and, at least, he may be sure that in that month he has the best chance of coming across the really big beasts, which, his Indian will tell him, retire during the rest of the year to the very highest peaks. This I doubt myself, as I have always tried the highest ground, and never done any better there with the big rams than elsewhere. My own belief is that all the sheep frequent the open tops in July and August, when the grass is fresh where the snow has but recently disappeared; that in September they come down nearer the timber, and even into it, in search of sweeter feed than that which the sunburnt tops afford; that during this time the old rams are away by themselves hiding in the bush; and that in October, when the uplands have been revived by the late autumn rains, the ewes seek the hill-tops again, and the amorous rams follow the ewes.
But at whatever season you seek the bighorn, remember that he is very easily driven away, that all his senses are exceptionally keen, and that from his vantage ground above he incessantly watches the valley beneath. Therefore, if you are changing camp, do not arrange matters so as to arrive in a new country, which you intend to hunt, about nightfall, or if you do, reduce the chopping which has to be done to a minimum; don’t light big fires, and let those you light be as much hidden as possible from the ridges upon which you expect to find game. If possible, it is better to get to a fresh shooting ground so early that you can do a day’s hunting before there is any necessity for cutting timber or lighting a fire.
As it is not easy to weigh large game in camp, and as I am no believer in guess-weights, I shall not attempt to estimate the weight of a bighorn ram; but, bearing in mind that the O. montana is one of the most compactly built animals in the world, the curious in such matters may form an approximate idea of the beast’s weight from the following measurements of a 16-in. ram, which I took myself within an hour of his death. Measuring him as he lay, this ram was 3 ft. 6 ins. from the root of his tail to where the neck is set on to the shoulder; his girth under his forelegs was 3 ft. 9 ins.; and his height, as nearly as I could get it, 3 ft. 2 ins. at the shoulder.
VI. THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN GOAT (Haploceros montanus)
Rocky Mountain goats
The Rocky Mountain Goat may, like other animals, vary in its habits a good deal in different localities. In British Columbia, which appears to be peculiarly its home, I am bound to say that it appears to be the biggest fool that walks on four legs. I am aware that some authorities upon sport, whose opinions deserve consideration, differ from me upon this point, but living as I do at present amongst British Columbians, I am not afraid of being contradicted by local sportsmen when I aver that there is no wild animal easier to stalk than Haploceros. There are many men out here who, after having killed their first few heads, will have nothing more to do with goat hunting, regarding it as unworthy the name of sport. I remember well one old goat which I stalked in the Bridge River country. The beast was a very big one, and was first seen feeding upon a bare hillside. He was on one side of an amphitheatre, we were on the other. Between us lay over half a mile of rattling shale and moraine, and there was no cover for a mouse. However, there was nothing else to hunt, and the goat was the largest I had ever seen, so with my Indian behind me I began the stalk. I am confident that any other beast would have seen us before we had gone a hundred yards; we slipped and fell, we rattled the stones about, and the whole thing was so ludicrous that I had to sit down and laugh more than once; but in spite of all this I got within forty yards of the poor stupid brute, who had been looking in our direction in a puzzled way for the last ten minutes, and felt thoroughly ashamed of myself when I put an end to his doubts with a bullet. To give an idea of the tameness of these brutes, I took six or seven photographs of goats in one day last year with a very elaborate photographic apparatus, the photographs unfortunately being destroyed before they could be developed, when the whole apparatus, together with my guide, went rolling down a steep incline almost into the Bridge River.
Though not worth stalking, these goats are quaint beasts and worth watching. As a rule, they live where nothing else would care to, on precipitous rock faces overhanging a stream where no grass grows, and where there is very little even to browse upon. Just at dawn you may see them crossing a wall of rock high above your camp in single file, or wending their way slowly from their feeding grounds to the timber patches in which they lie all day. They are very local in their distribution and very conservative in their habits, infesting one small mountain in great numbers and never seeming to stray into the neighbouring heights. Day after day they appear to seek the same feeding grounds, and retire to the same lairs, with a punctuality which would be becoming in a postman. Their meat is so poor that Indians will hardly eat it, and the market value of their hides is only 3s. 6d. to a tourist. They occupy only such localities as other beasts would despise, and altogether seem somewhat justified in the mute protest of their wondering regard when attacked, which seems to say as plainly as dumb beasts can speak, ‘Surely you are not going to meddle with us; we, at least, are beasts of no account.’ To obtain a good specimen head their haunts ought to be visited as late in the year as possible, as the coats are not so white or the beards so long in early autumn as they are in November, and a goat’s head without the long patriarchal beard is a poor affair. They abound all over British Columbia, especially in such places as Bute Inlet, and I have even seen them on the islands in the Straits of San Juan, from which I am inclined to infer that they had swum over from the mainland. An old billy which I shot girthed 56 ins. round the chest after he had been skinned, and the longest horns of which I have any record measured 11½ ins. from base to tip. The accompanying plate gives a better idea of the queer old-world appearance of the Rocky Mountain goat than any word-painting of mine could do. In old days, the Indians used to make blankets of their fleece, but the industry appears to be nearly dead, now that English blankets have become cheap and plentiful in British Columbia, so that there appears to be no reason why the white goat should not be allowed to remain unmolested for many years to come. I have seen Haploceros in Alaska as well as in British Columbia, and expect that my friend Mr. John Fannin, curator of the British Columbian Museum, is right in inferring that the goats go as far north as the mountains do. The skin, measured by Mr. Fannin, and mentioned in his article upon goats in the ‘Big Game of North America,’ is far and away the largest I have ever heard of, a skin 5 ft. from horns to tail, by 40 ins. from side to side, being an exceptionally large one, whereas Mr. Fannin’s large skin measured 7 ft. by 4 ft. 10 ins.