Utah Rocks! - Bighorn Sheep edition
On our hike yesterday we scrambled down a snowy ravine and explored a washout section of the creek we previously dubbed "Bone Creek" after @thingone found an elk skull with antlers in an upstream section. Today we found these Bighorn Sheep ram skulls!
(We didn't find the skulls together like that, I posed them for the photo :)
Here is the first skull we found in situ. You can see some ribs behind the skull, and it looked like the complete skeleton was mostly there under the snow.
I am honestly not sure what the story is with these sheep. I don't think bighorn sheep normally come down to the base of the mountain where we found these very close to town.
It is possible that they might be poached / illegal kills; the forest service road runs almost directly above the stream bed here and it would be a convenient spot to pull over and toss the hide and bones down a steep ravine after dressing a carcass for meat.
In any case, we are going to treasure the skulls of these beautiful animals now. I hauled them out down to our car (the skulls are surprisingly heavy - apparently the horns of a bighorn sheep can weigh up to 30 pounds!).
The skulls are in a big tub of water now to undergo cold water maceration process (basically letting water and bacteria digest all the soft tissue bits and clean the skull for us).
Give us this day your daily ROCKS
Sink your teeth into these beauties :) Pebble and rock action from yesterday's hike.
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I shared on twitter: https://twitter.com/CarlNas02364312/status/1231837998070861824?s=20
Wow quite a few bones in bone river! Beautiful rocks too! @carlgnash! :-)
Thought maybe the rams got stuck together when in rut, but then I read
they were posed. Awesome finds! What will you do with them when
cleaned up? I've seen some before that were painted looked really cool.
Great adventures out finding things! Wonderful memories forsure!
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Wow man, this looks so creepy yet so fascinating! I though it was fake or something before I clicked at your post but f*ck, exciting what you can find in Utah.
Great edition.
Have a great day Carl and #SKATEFORLIFE.
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Cool I want photography this heads 👌😋👌👌👌👀 they look very cool in black and white .
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How do you find them like that? They seem not to have been around all that long. Certainly didn't die of old age (judging by the horns) ....
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I think unfortunately the most likely answer is these were poached :( We also found some animal hides stuck in the trees that looked like people had thrown them down into the ravine from above. I don't think a legitimate hunter would discard the skull and horns of a bighorn sheep, the skull with horns is actually valuable not to mention a trophy item
I actually suspected that and started to type it in (certainly not a predator kill). They would not have been trophy in Alberta,Canada where I lived (idk about the US): the curl of the horn has to reach the corner of the eye. http://www.albertaregulations.ca/huntingregs/gameregs.html
About the hides you seen (from these regulations): It is unlawful, with the following exceptions, to allow the pelt of any furbearing animal to be wasted. (the exceptions were authorized control of problem wildlife).
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Hey Carl. I was planning to drive up to Boise from Utah this week, but in light of the latest Covid 19 scares, I'd prefer a travel companion. If you're interested, let me know. I'm on discord as @littlescribe.
Hi @littlescribe I am full-time stay at home dad, watching my two boys (5 and 3) so not available for a road trip. Definitely interesting times, wouldn't be that surprised to see domestic travel bans in coming weeks. Good luck and safe travels!
Yeah, I was kind of thinking that as well. I may have to postpone my long awaited trip for a few months from now -- assuming it's possible!!!