27 minute read
2022 Convention Awards
GORDON EASTMAN GRASS ROOTS AWARD
The late Gordon Eastman created the Grass Roots Award to recognize extraordinary commitment of Chapter and Affiliate members to WSF’s mission. This year’s winner is Lee Howard of the Utah, Montana and Idaho WSF chapters. Howard has been involved in various bighorn sheep restoration projects over the past three-plus decades. Beyond substantial financial support for countless projects encompassing habitat enhancement and wild sheep transplants and reintroductions, Howard proved himself a champion of hands-on conservation.
Howard has promoted wild sheep research, wild sheep management plans, habitat acquisition and restoration, and transplant and reintroduction projects for over 30 years. He has worked with multiple states and provinces including Utah, Montana, Arizona, Nevada, Idaho, Wyoming, British Columbia and other states to capture and relocate sheep to their historic ranges and establish new wild sheep herds. As a lead negotiator, he achieved domestic sheep grazing allotment buyouts in Utah, Idaho and Nevada to prevent wild bighorn exposure to disease. This included negotiating domestic sheep grazing allotment buyouts for WSF’s Hells Canyon Initiative.
Howard co-founded the Utah Foundation for North American Wild Sheep, where he served as president and a member of the board of directors. He served nine years on the Utah Wildlife Regional Advisory Council and six years on the Utah State Wildlife Board. From 2011 to 2019, he served on the Idaho WSF Chapter board of directors.
In one of his most memorable roles, Howard was instrumental in organizing a capture of wild sheep in Montana’s Bitterroot Valley and transferring them to Utah in the early 2000s. Howard even drove the truck to haul the bighorns back to Utah in the dead of winter.
“What has impressed me with Lee is his bighorn sheep volunteer work has been over so many years,” said retired federal bighorn sheep biologist Tim Schommer in his nomination letter. “In my opinion, Lee exceeds the criteria for receiving the Grass Roots Award.”
According to Shane Clouse, past president of the Montana WSF Chapter, Howard has helped numerous times when Montana didn’t have the funding for a conservation project. “Lee helped MTWSF (MTFNAWS) procure the funding for major projects in 2002, 2005 and another in 2006. At a time when MTWSF was a very small organization with limited funding, Lee helped us find more than $100,000 for projects,” said Clouse.
Echoing this was another Montana WSF past president Tom Powers, who noted that, over the decades, he and Howard worked closely on many different grantin-aid endeavors that benefitted wild sheep in Montana, Utah and nationally. “When I called Lee Howard at Utah FNAWS, which was on a regular basis, he would say to me, ‘How much should we write the check out for this time, Tom?’ Utah was always there for us.” This included habitat project funding, donating a Dall’s sheep hunt for the Montana WSF fundraiser, and contributing to buyouts of domestic sheep grazing allotments to protect wild bighorns from disease. According to past Idaho WSF president Brad Morlock, when Howard began working for wild sheep restoration in the late 1980s, Utah had approximately 500 wild sheep. Today, Utah hosts between 5,000 and 6,000 of three subspecies: Rocky Mountain, California and desert.
“While working with Utah FNAWS, Lee was involved in over 20 major habitat acquisition projects and nearly 30 wild sheep transplants,” said Morlock in his nomination letter. “On October 10, 2021, I was privileged to be present when an 82-year-old Lee Howard harvested a fine 10-plus-year-old California bighorn from the Newfoundland Mountains in Utah, a herd he helped transplant and establish. Lee has taken his four North American wild sheep, but he has put THOUSANDS back!
WILD SHEEP BIOLOGIST’S WALL OF FAME
Wildlife veterinarian Helen Schwantje, DVM, of British Columbia’s Ministry of Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations & Rural Development, spent her 35-plus-year career focused on proactive management of wild sheep and their conservation needs. As both a wildlife veterinarian and adjunct professor at various institutions, she not only advanced wildlife conservation but also inspired the next generation. Two of her protegees are now wildlife veterinarians for BC and the Northwest Territories. Wild sheep health assessments have formed a huge part of Schwantje’s work, including her leadership on BC’s Wildlife Health Monitoring Program for caribou, moose, elk, deer and wild sheep. She has been a leader in developing habitat buffer zones between BC’s domestic sheep and goats and wild herds on public land. During her long membership in WSF, she has become a go-to expert in the conservation community. Her numerous publications cover a broad range of her expertise in wildlife research, management and health.
Schwantje has been active for many years with the Western Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies (WAFWA) Wildlife Health Committee and Wild Sheep Working Group. In addition to training future biologists and professional wildlife biologists, she has cultivated crucial working relationships with myriad groups. These include First Nations, guide/ outfitter associations, the agriculture sector, domestic sheep producers and public health agencies. “Helen is not only an accomplished professional, she is a highly-respected wildlife veterinarian, colleague and a long-time friend to me,” says WSF Vice President of Conservation – Thinhorn Programs Kevin Hurley. “In recognition of her nearly 40-year and continuing career, and for her leadership on wild sheep health, management and conservation, I am proud to welcome her into the Wild Sheep Biologist’s Wall of Fame.”
Upon the nominations of three WSF chapter presidents (Bill London of Idaho WSF, Kevin Martin of Oregon FNAWS and Andy Kelso of Washington WSF), the 2022 State Statesman Award was conferred on Dr. Frances Cassirer, the senior wildlife research biologist for Idaho Fish and Game. The trio of chapter presidents have worked with Cassirer for over 25 years on a range of bighorn sheep issues.
“Frances’ experience, knowledge and leadership has made her a leader in bighorn sheep field research and management not only in the states of Idaho, Oregon and Washington but across the West,” wrote London, Martin and Kelso in their nomination letter. Through a vast network of cooperative endeavors with diverse stakeholders and scientists, Cassirer has researched and managed bighorn sheep then shared her knowledge with the broader conservation community. These research efforts include her collaborations with universities, state and federal wildlife and land management agencies, and WSF’s Chapters and Affiliates. She has been a leader in communicating bighorn sheep issues and field research to multiple agencies and interests.
“Her sharing of knowledge allows others, like our chapters, to then interact, inform and educate at state, local and individual levels,” wrote London, Martin and Kelso.
For 25 years, Cassirer has devoted her expertise to WSF’s cooperative Hells Canyon Bighorn Sheep Initiative. She was a leader in the development and utilization of the highly promising capture-test-remove method to control the spread of Movi in Hells Canyon. This method is now being implemented across the West. She also identified the Ten Mile Ranch property, a vital lambing area near the Snake River, as a high priority for a conservation easement. This led to acquisition of lands and habitat critical for bighorns in Hells Canyon.
Cassirer has conducted annual field population surveys in the Hells Canyon area of Idaho, Oregon and Washington. Her research, coupled with findings from other biologists in the Hells Canyon area, provided the sheep movement data that formed the basis for the development of the national Risk of Contact model.
Cassirer’s innovative work with Dr. Tom Besser, Washington State University, emeritus, identified Movi as the primary pathogen responsible for bighorn sheep disease and die offs. Over the past quarter century, she has authored and co-authored refereed scientific and other professional publications concerning bighorn sheep disease identification and recovery.
Public education on wildlife and habitat issues is a huge aspect of Cassirer’s work. She has appeared as an expert in numerous videos, the most recent being Wild & Wool, a short film that premiered at WSF’s 2021 virtual convention. She has also consulted for and edited multiple Idaho Fish and Game YouTube videos to educate the public and agency professionals.
STATE STATESMAN
To honor the legendary outdoor writerhunter-conservationist, the Jack O’Connor Hunting Heritage and Education Center and WSF inaugurated the Jack O’Connor Writers Award at this year’s Sheep Show. The award, to be conferred annually, recognizes the author of the best published article about wild sheep, with special focus on hunting and/or conservation. The first winner is Angelo Baio for his story, “Sun, Dust and Borrego Cimarron” published in the Boone and Crockett Club’s magazine Fair Chase.
Baio has been a freelance writer for 10 years, with his first article, “Full Circle,” published in Wild Sheep magazine in 2012.
“My goal was not to simply write an article,” Baio says. “My intention was to live out a dream that I literally embarked upon in my youth to follow my idol Jack O’Connor’s hunting adventures in Outdoor Life. I am most notably fascinated by Jack’s accounts of his wild sheep hunting adventures, especially those in the deserts of Sonora that read akin to a Western novel. In those days, the land was wild and untamed; the logistics and survival challenges of hunting in a foreign land was as much an adventure as the hunt itself. Jack’s stories epitomized true free-range hunting adventure and inspired my forty-year quest to also one day hunt the desert bighorn sheep in the Sierras of Sonora.”
Baio was selected by the judging panel to receive a bronze bust of the legendary writer, created by world renowned sculptor Jack Logozzo, especially for this contest.
Jack O’Connor was the undisputed dean of outdoor writers, a world-class big-game hunter, wildlife conservation pioneer and influential gun editor. Born in 1902, he presided over the “golden age” of modern big game hunting and left a rich legacy through his writing and leadership. Despite his death in 1978, his work remains fresh and continues to inspire hunters of all ages. His special contribution, in a wide and long list of accomplishments, was in educating hunters about wild sheep and sheep hunting.
Jack moved his family from his native Arizona to Lewiston, Idaho, in 1948 and spent the last 30 years of his life there. The Jack O’Connor Hunting Heritage and Education Center, located in Lewiston, was established in 2006 to bring Jack’s collection back to his hometown and make it available for the public to enjoy. This award recognizing a government official for their extraordinary contributions to wild sheep conservation at the national level is not conferred annually. Over the past 43 years, WSF has only given the award 22 times since Dr. Valerius Geist received the first one, and the last time WSF named a Federal Outstanding Statesman was 2018. This year, the recipient was undeniably worthy of the honor: Chief Veterinary Officer for the Yukon Territory Mary VanderKop, DVM.
VanderKop’s leadership in developing the Yukon’s historic Control Order 2018001 created one of the most forwardthinking and aggressive legal documents ever written to protect wild sheep health through prevention of contact with diseasecausing organisms carried by domestic livestock. Launched in 2020, the Yukon Control Order spans the entire province. Canada’s Yukon is home to one-quarter of all the thinhorn sheep on the planet.
“In my opinion, the Yukon Control Order is the strongest, most pro-active and progressive effort anywhere to address and minimize the risk of wild-domestic sheep and goat contact,” says WSF Vice President of Conservation – Thinhorn Programs Kevin Hurley. “The Yukon is leading the
way on this critically important issue.” Yukon’s Control Order rests on four pillars: separation, containment, testing and mitigation. It mandates that domestic sheep and goat owners must keep their animals below 1,000 meters of elevation and be maintained in an enclosure that is approved annually by a government inspector. Records on each animal’s purchase, sale, health status and slaughter are mandatory. All domestic sheep and goats in the Yukon must carry permanent identification and undergo testing yearly for respiratory pathogens, with a focus on Movi. Enclosure fences must be approved yearly by a government inspector and engineered to keep wild and domestic species separated, preventing nose-to-nose contact.
First-year results of the Control Order found a surprisingly high percentage of Movi in the territory’s domestic sheep and goats—43% and 16% respectively. All animals that tested positive were either put down or removed from the Yukon. By the second year, testing revealed the disease hits plummeted. Year three results are pending, and the Control Order is set to expire by the end of 2024.
Over her 45-year career, VanderKop has made other historic impacts on wildlife science and management. As the Yukon Territory’s first chief veterinary officer and director for the Animal Health Unit, she developed and delivered animal health and welfare programs and created the legislative framework to support them. Her approach has proven ahead of its time in recognizing the connection between human health and the environmental health of domestic and wild animals.
Among her numerous awards and scholarships, she received the Yukon Territory Deputy Minister’s Award in 2014 for her role in developing the province’s Animal Health Act, and she has many publications to her credit.
Due to pandemic-related travel restrictions, VanderKop could not receive her award in Reno this year but will accept it this coming May in Whitehorse during WSF’s Thinhorn Sheep Summit III. The recipient of this honor, which WSF has not awarded in many years, starting chasing sheep when he was 11 and has been doing so for another 54 years. He was born in Plainview, Texas, and followed his family to New Mexico, Utah and then Oklahoma, where he finished high school then graduated from Oklahoma State University with a degree in wildlife management.
In 1992, he joined Texas Parks & Wildlife, and when he turned 40, with his kids still in high school, he enrolled in the master’s program at Sul Ross State University in Alpine, Texas. He moved up the Texas Parks & Wildlife ladder over his nearly 30 years of service, reaching the post of interim wildlife director. He has served as the chair of the Western Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies (WAFWA) Wild Sheep Working Group, and for more than 15 years served the Desert Bighorn Council on the technical staff, with the past five years as technical staff chair.
Yet, his true identity is “Mr. Desert Bighorn,” for Clay Brewer is largely credited with the exceptional comeback of desert bighorns in the Lone Star State, though his vast humility would prevent him from admitting to it.
Upon his 2016 retirement from Texas Parks & Wildlife, WSF aggressively recruited him to become the foundation’s conservation director with a focus on desert bighorns in the southwest and Mexico. For the next six years, Brewer would serve WSF and bighorn sheep herds with class and distinction.
Always one to pass credit he rightly deserves, Brewer has kept his eyes eternally “on that ram on the ridgeline,” using his exceptional skills as a negotiator, innovator, instigator, peacemaker and sometimes-antagonist if necessary to get things done. Among his successes, Brewer served as the catalyst, along with WSF board of directors member Emilio Rangel, in forming WSF’s Mexico Council, an advisory body on all opportunities and issues in Mexico.
Brewer was also the dynamo behind WSF’s Mexico Initiative to put and keep wild and free-ranging sheep on Mexico’s mountains using market forces to foster a lasting legacy for Mexico and her people. This has proven exceedingly successful, with desert sheep populations surging across northern Mexico and high fences being torn down to return bighorns to roam freely throughout their historic ranges.
On March 1, 2022, Brewer retired from WSF, but his legacy of selfless service, dedication to mission, professionalism and international cooperation across borders and cultures will be forever remembered and revered.
OUTSTANDING CONSERVATIONIST
CHAIR’S AWARD
This award was presented at the 2022 Sheep Show by Peregrine Wolff, DVM, chair of WSF’s board of directors, who noted that she began her term as board chair as the pandemic gripped the world in May 2020. The turmoil and uncertainties of the time called for action and new ideas.
The board of directors met monthly by Zoom with WSF President and CEO Gray N. Thornton to discuss strategy and the next steps for the organization’s future. WSF staff spent the early summer unsure of what the 2021 convention would look like. They soon determined that a virtual experience was the only option. “With that decision finally made, WSF’s staff charged forward with a virtual convention. It was a success and raised record amounts of funds for wild sheep conservation. This success was directly due to the hard work and belief of WSF’s staff that they could deliver an amazing experience under any circumstances,” Wolff said in Reno.
With equal uncertainty throughout 2021, WSF’s staff used their experience to deliver 2022’s “hybrid” Sheep Show that continued the foundation’s extraordinary fundraising and served as a long-awaited reunion for hunter-conservationists in the Wild Sheep family.
In conferring the Chair’s Award, Wolff said, “This award is actually from the sheep. I am just the messenger. WSF staff: Thank you for unflinchingly tackling two years of extreme and unprecedented uncertainty and change without ever losing focus on the WSF mission. This award is from the wild sheep of the past, present and future.”
The Chair’s Award honors these courageous and visionary professionals:
Gray N. Thornton – President/CEO Michelle Bodenheimer – Operations & eCommerce Manager Kevin Hurley – Vice President of Conservation – Thinhorn Programs Clay Brewer – Conservation Director Bighorn Programs Kurt Alt – Conservation Director Montana & International Sheep & Goat Programs Terry Ziehl – Finance Director Kim Nieters – Auction/Awards Director Keith Balfourd – Director of Marketing & Communications Paige Culver – Development Manager Maddie Pennaz – Membership Manager/<1Clubs Manager Megan Costanza – Banquets & Events Manager Mike Aiazzi – Expo & Exhibits Manager Hannah Stewart – Administrative Assistant
PRESIDENT’S AWARD
Recognizing above-and-beyond commitment to WSF and its mission, the 2022 President’s Award was conferred at the Sheep Show to Larry Johns, who has served the conservation community in more ways than anyone can count, with incredible results for conservation. Since 2010, Johns has served as WSF’s raffle chair, and the spectacular and ever-increasing fundraising results. He leads by example as a WSF Summit Life Member, Patron Sponsor and Chadwick Ram Society Gold-Level member. Johns has been a member of WSF’s Ethics Committee since 2016 and for the past five years has served as its chair.
Among the many other organizations Johns volunteers his time, treasure and talent to support are Safari Club International (SCI), the Mule Deer Foundation and the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation (RMEF). He has also served on the Beretta and SCI Foundation Conservation Leadership Award committee since 2020 and on the Weatherby Foundation International’s selection committee responsible for choosing the recipient of the esteemed Weatherby Hunting and Conservation Award.
For SCI, Johns has served since 1997 as a volunteer on a variety of committees, including those devoted to chapter development, awards, ethics and hospitality. For six years, he was the founding president of SCI’s Sutter Buttes Chapter in Yuba City, Calif., and served three terms as president of the Northern Nevada SCI Chapter. For the Mule Deer Foundation, he worked as regional director for two years.
“As president of the Wild Sheep Foundation, I recognize and salute Larry Johns’ tireless and exceptional efforts spanning three decades and multiple organizations serving wildlife, their habitat and our hunting and conservation heritage. His work has and continues to “Put and Keep Wild Sheep on the Mountain®,” said WSF President and CEO Gray N. Thornton.
ARTEMIS OUTSTANDING WOMAN CONSERVATIONIST AWARD
This year’s Artemis Award winner is a woman of many firsts who made history in the realm of wildlife management and conservation across the nation. Ellen Campbell’s life as a humble trailblazer began in 1975, when she became the first woman to receive a Master’s of Science in wildlife management from West Virginia University. Armed with her new credentials, she initially experienced a few setbacks, like the time she applied for a job and was told a woman would not fit in with an all-male crew. Or the time a prospective employer showed interest and asked her to send a photograph of herself—then turned her down.
Undaunted, Campbell went on to become the first woman forestry aide at the Forest Sciences Lab in Morgantown, WV, and the first female District III game superintendent for the West Virginia Department of Natural Resources in the 1970s. More firsts would follow. Campbell became the first woman to serve as a forest wildlife biologist on the George Washington National Forest and the first female wildlife biologist working in the Southern Regional Office. She became the first woman staff officer for the National Forests in Mississippi, where Campbell pioneered work on threatened and endangered species such as the gopher tortoise and red-cockaded woodpecker. These never-done-befores would be the norm throughout her life.
Though women were an anomaly in the wildlife management field and resistance to women in the profession was prevalent when Campbell embarked on her career, she persevered with polite firmness and courageous commitment. With intelligence and quiet fortitude, she became a trusted expert respected by her colleagues.
In 1998, the Forest Service sent her to help fight Yellowstone National Park’s raging wildfires. While she was coordinating information and equipment for firefighters, she met her future husband Dale, a fellow Forest Service biologist from Kalispell, Montana. In 1990, the couple was assigned to Juneau, where Campbell was the first woman to serve as Wildlife and Ecology Program Leader for the Alaska Region, covering the two largest national forests in the US.
Over their 17 years in the Last Frontier, Campbell became the first woman to lead the Terrestrial Ecology Program for the Alaska Region. Her work encompassed sweeping wildlife and habitat programs, including advancements for wetlands conservation, waterfowl habitat, mountain goat sustainability and watchable wildlife programs for the public. She worked with other agencies to institute a statewide neotropical migratory bird monitoring program to assess, for the first time, what populations existed in Alaska. Supervising and finding meaningful work for a woman staffer who had multiple sclerosis earned Campbell the Governor of Alaska’s certificate of appreciation for her outstanding efforts in service to people with disabilities.
Her humble get-it-done ethos was nationally celebrated in 1996, when the US Forest Service presented her with the Jack Adams Award, recognizing her dedication as a biologist and her lifetime of impactful work for the betterment of wildlife, all while remaining out of the limelight. Taking the top honor in a field of over 1,100 other wildlife professionals, Campbell was the first woman to receive the national award.
“I feel that a career in wildlife management and participating in hunting are activities that all women should feel empowered to pursue,” Campbell explains.
After retiring from the Forest Service and relocating with Dale to Oregon in 2007, Campbell immediately took on the role of Northwest Section Representative to the governing council of The Wildlife Society, where she was instrumental in developing policies on an array of national and international issues. In 2012, The Wildlife Society inducted her as a Fellow for her exceptional service to her profession. Two years later, the Society honored her with its Distinguished Service Award.
As a WSF life member and a past board member for Oregon WSF, Campbell has volunteered her time on guzzler development in southeast Oregon’s Steens Mountain and a juniper removal project to improve sheep habitat in central Oregon’s John Day area. For the annual Oregon chapter fundraising banquet, Ellen and Dale donate auction items and have helped organize the event. At the Sheep Show, you can find Ellen and Dale staffing the Oregon WSF booth.
As a way to pay it forward, Ellen Campbell currently serves as treasurer of a local chapter of P.E.O., an international organization that raises funds to support college scholarships for women.
G.C.F DALZIEL OUTSTANDING GUIDE AWARD
What is an outstanding guide? While every hunter may come up with a different description of their dream guide, they universally would agree on a combination of adjectives: experienced, reliable, knowledgeable, personable, honest, capable, dedicated and respected. For many WSF members, the name attached to each one of these attributes is this year’s G.C.F. Dalziel Outstanding Guide Alan Klassen of Arctic Red River Outfitters in the Northwest Territories.
According to one of his many nomination letters, 63-year-old Klassen has “seen it all. . . Al remembers bygone days where wages were $50 and a great tip was a used pair of slippers.” Guiding in the Mackenzie Mountains to this day, Klassen exhibits unrelenting passion for the land and utmost respect for his outfitters, fellow guides and camp crews. While he guides caribou and moose hunts, his true calling is sheep hunting.
A fervent adherent to fair chase and high ethical hunting standards, Klassen takes pride in backpack-style hunts and has led his clients to harvest an astounding 149 rams: 146 Dall’s and three Stone’s. In his personal hunting, Klassen has harvested over 20 Dall’s sheep and several Stone’s. He knows the vast Arctic Red River landscape like no other, having explored every corner of its nearly 10,000-square-mile remote formidableness.
“Al lives, breathes and bleeds wild sheep,” says hunter Brandon Darling. “This man can hunt harder than men half his age.”
Energetic, patient and kind, Klassen is a stickler for safety and is as tough as they come. Stormy weather, dicey terrain and grizzly bears in camp are no match for his intelligence and instincts. Hilarious, gentle, driven, he has guided celebrities, millionaires and regular Joes, and treated everyone with equal courtesy and consideration.
Klassen has been featured in the book, Voices from the Mackenzies: A History of People who have worked in the Mackenzie Mountains Outfitting Industry and in YETI’s Stories from the Wild along with various online publications and podcasts.
Simply put, Klassen is “one of the finest guides to walk the peaks of the Mackenzies,” says Regan Yeager, who identifies himself as Klassen’s past client, former co-worker and damn lucky friend.
THE CONKLIN AWARD
The Conklin Foundation, founded to honor Dr. James Conklin as the inspiration to fair-chase hunters worldwide, created the Conklin Award to recognize a preeminent hunter with a leading record of harvesting extremely challenging species and dangerous game worldwide. This year’s winner, announced at the 2022 Sheep Show, is Sergey Yastrzhembsky. Twenty-five years ago, while serving as a Russian ambassador, Yastrzhembsky
began his hunting career by harvesting a European roe deer in the mountains of Slovakia. With hundreds of hunts spanning 52 countries and six continents, this year’s Conklin winner admits that his career interfered with his hunting and vice versa. Hunting-conservation ultimately won out.
Of his more than 336 animal species and subspecies harvested, Yastrzhembsky has seen more than 260 of them included in the SCI Record Book, with more than 105 trophies included in the Top 20 and 30plus listed in the Top 10.
The Yastrebfilm company that Yastrzhembsky founded in 2009 has made more than 70 films, many focused on the benefits of hunting-conservation. He has received over 20 national and international awards for his filmmaking. His documentaries, Ivory. A Crime Story and Tigers and Humans, are devoted to conservation of African elephants and Amur tigers in the wild. Both have received many prestigious awards at international film festivals. In 2021, Yastrebfilm released a full-length documentary, Shot of Hope, highlighting the importance of hunting for wildlife conservation. In addition, he authored a television series about hunting, game breeding and wildlife conservation that aired on Russian TV. Yastrzhembsky is a published author of a book and magazine articles that cover his hunting adventures and the skills of aboriginal hunters.
“The joy of discovery, the thrill of meeting new people, the emotions of successes and defeats that make you stronger, the ability to overcome yourself when you want to give up. This is what the hunt gave me, and I am infinitely grateful for this!” he says. “I am proud to be part of the great hunting family and will continue, as I have always done, to uphold the values of honest ethical hunting, without which there can be no future for wildlife.”
FRANK GOLATA OUTSTANDING OUTFITTER AWARD
The Artee Family of Sierra El Álamo is a standard-bearer for Sonora’s desert sheep conservation movement, transforming their bighorns from high-fence captives to free-range monarchs. Outfitter Javier Artee, owner of Alcampo Hunting Adventures, Sierra El Álamo and Alcampo Ranch, built up a desert sheep herd and, just a few years ago, began releasing bands of them into the wild with the help of his sons Javier Jr., Jorge, Jacob and José-Roberto. For their dedication to repatriating desert bighorns into their historic habitat, the Artee Family and Sierra El Álamo have earned past recognition with WSF’s Conservation Award and now the 2022 Frank Golata Outstanding Outfitter honor.
“According to the numbers of 2016, there were a little more than 7,500 desert sheep in Sonora, free-range and high-fence combined—about 3,800 free range and rest in high fence,” explains Jacob Artee. Today over 10,000 desert sheep flourish in Sonora, with between 825 and 1,000 roaming wild throughout the state. Over 20 percent of those bighorns were set free by the Artees, a conservation success they hope other private ranches will emulate.
Through multiple releases over the past four-and-a-half years, Sierra El Álamo has freed 176 sheep from high fences, with another 50 scheduled to be liberated this spring. When this happens, the Artees will have met and exceeded their five-year goal of returning 200 desert bighorns to their traditional unfenced habitat. To support the wildlife and raise the odds of their survival, the Artees have invested in water projects including wells, drinkers and dams to capture the ranch’s scant precipitation. “We are doing this because we want to teach everyone what we’re doing. This is something you need to share, to show others how to do it,” Jacob says.
In 2018, Jacob Artee became one of the founding members of WSF’s Mexico Council, which he serves as vice president. Consisting of Mexico’s leading experts on wild sheep, the Council is an advisory board to WSF’s board of directors on all issues surrounding Mexico’s bighorn conservation efforts. While remaining active in expanding their on-the-ground wild sheep projects, Mexico Council members educate government officials and fellow landowners about desert bighorns and the importance of fair-chase huntingconservation. As ambassadors and advocates, the Artee Family and Sierra El Álamo are leading by example in the great comeback of Mexico’s wild desert sheep and the ethical hunting-conservation to assure their future.
DSC’s mission is to ensure the conservation of wildlife through public engagement, education and advocacy for well-regulated hunting and sustainable use.
JOIN US!
DSC Convention January 5-8, 2023
Thank you to ALASKA WILD WIND ADVENTURES
Congratulations on a 100% success year. My highest respect and gratitude to Ben Pettaway #A1 guide! Thank you for believing in me! Thank you Cabot Pitts as well as Josh Chadd! Amazing, hard and unforgettable. Vince Bloom
WINNER WILL RECEIVE A FULLY GUIDED ONE-ON-ONE DESERT SHEEP HUNT WITH SIERRA EL ALAMO IN 2024-25
• All current and new CRS members are entered into the hunt drawing • Current and new CRS members receive one (1) entry for every $250 PAID towards a CRS pledge. • Need not be present to win. • Facebook Live drawing to be held June 30, 2022.
