Be very very quiet – its Bighorn Sheep hunting season . . . starting Saturday.
Wyoming Game and Fish has announced it’s opening the bighorn sheep hunting season beginning August 1 through August 31 in the Owl Creek drainage portion of Bighorn Sheep Hunt Area 5. This new, earlier hunting date is exclusively for Hunt Area 5, which stretches from the south of Cody along WY 120 all the way to Thermopolis, incorporating part of the Shoshone National Forest and Wind River Mountains.
Generally, Hunt Area 5 opens to hunting on September 1st, but Wyoming Game and Fish changed the season dates thru an emergency rule, under authority granted to the Department by Governor Gordon to amend Chapter 9 – Bighorn Sheep and Mountain Goat Hunting Seasons. This new date reflects the when’s and where’s of domestic sheep that occupy the Owl Creek Drainage. Domestic sheep share several diseases with bighorn sheep, and there’s an omnipresent fear that disease could be transmitted between the wild and domestic sheep herds.
If this affects your hunting season, you’ll know. Each licensed Bighorn Sheep Hunt Area 5 hunter will receive a letter from Game and Fish with additional information. Hunters with questions about the August 1 opener, the Owl Creek drainage limitation or access should contact the Cody Regional Office at (307) 527-7125.
