J Lewis doing what he does best

Good friend and BTO guide, J Lewis, had a pretty eventful year.  He had planned on guiding an elk client last fall until he found out his wife was expecting and due the middle of September.  To make matters worse, J drew a unit 1 archery bull tag!  By the start of the hunt, J's wife was already having contractions and in the early stages of labor.  By day 4, J got the "word" that it was time to kill because a baby was on the way.  On the morning of day 5, J got his shot at a great 6x7 at 35 yards.  But he missed!  As the bull ran off, another bull came up the ridge and stopped in the exact same spot.  This time J made good with his recurve and his bull was down.

J and his Recurve



J's Bull was 50" Wide



This was the 43rd bull that J had seen in just 4.5 days of hunting.  And J's wife gave birth to their 3rd child just days later.  It was a baby girl.

In November, J and his friend Tim, also bought left-over coues deer tags in southern AZ.  They were itching to try out some long range shooting with Tim's 7mm.  J got his wish and dumped this coues buck at 642 yards.



J had one more hunt up his sleeve.  J had drawn a Barbary sheep tag in New Mexico during the month of February.  This is what J said about his hunt.
"My Barbary sheep hunt was about the hardest hunt I have ever done. These sheep are extremely spooky with excellent eyesight. We went the second week of the hunt and backpacked into a remote area. I saw several rams including two giants. But was not able to put it together. We spent 3 days and did over 25 miles and when we got back to the truck with no ram I knew I had to come back. The last week I made it back with a new plan to come in from a different area to access some sheep we had sent from several miles off on the first trip. On the second day we located the sheep in the same canyon and were able to get right to 500 yards when they busted us crawling through the grass. I set up as the sheep were all heading up over the ridge to some deep canyons on the other side. My ram and another separated from the yews and stopped just long enough to get a shot off. My ram was down about 11 miles from the truck! We were able to get the ram all packed out by the next afternoon after well over 20 miles total with heavy packs. My ram was 27 inches long with a good beard and chaps and is one of my hardest earned animals ever!"

Not a bad year for a skinny, white boy!!