By Will Primos

If you’re like me, you are one of those people who never win anything. When your name is finally drawn at the local DU banquet and you find out that you just won a new shotgun, you are almost in shock.

That’s how it was for me when I found out that I had drawn a non-resident Billy Goat tag in district 330 outside of Livingston Montana. September, October, and November are already so busy gathering the video footage necessary to produce The TRUTH®video series on elk, deer and waterfowl that I really had to figure out how I was going to work in this Billy Goat hunt. I decided that the best time for me to try and make the hunt would be the early part of October. This would be the fourth week of a month-long swing through Colorado and Montana hunting elk, whitetails and waterfowl.

Brad Farris was with me on this hunt. He was in charge of running the camera capturing the right video footage to share with viewers of Primos’ The TRUTH® About Hunting TV series. My wife, Mary, was also determined to go on this hunt in the high country of Montana for a Billy Goat.

Our first break came when we found the right outfitter to help us access the high country above Paradise Valley. Rising Son Outfitters is run by Randy Petrich. Randy and his wife, Dena, own several thousand acres at the base of the state-managed land that we would be hunting. Randy is a full-time outfitter as well as a part-time cattleman. Randy and Dena also work full-time raising three young boys (Zack-10, Zane-7, and Zander-4).

We arrived late morning on the ninth of October. After getting all our gear together and packing the horses, we made the horseback ride to base camp. It was a log cabin that Randy had built in order to set the stage for the next day’s trip up the mountain with his clients. Randy does quite a bit of deer, bear and elk guiding. After this trip I can attest to how hard Randy works. He has a very organized and efficient operation.

The whole family came with us to the base camp including Zack, Zane, and Zander. That proved to be one of the delights of the trip. There was no electricity, but we did have a makeshift shower and an outhouse that was well, you know, an outhouse. We got snowed in at base camp. Then a heavy fog moved in so we were stuck there for almost two days. I learned to play a card game named Chicken with Zander. I think I won once out of a hundred times. The kid is good!

On the third day the fog lifted enough to saddle the horses and mules. We headed out at 4:00 a.m. in the dark. It took about six hours of constant riding to reach our campsite. Upon our arrival, we went about setting up camp. We cleared about two feet of snow, built a fire ring and generally got ready for what could be a five-day camping and hunting trip.

The view from our campsite was absolutely gorgeous. You could look straight up the walls of the end of this canyon from where we were camping. It just seems like the stars are that much closer and brighter. Those of you who have been in that part of that country know what I’m talking about.

We got to camp right after noon so we hurried to set up camp. We then set out on foot to a certain part of the mountain range to see if we could find a goat that Randy had located during the last week of scouting. We found tracks in the snow and saw where the goats had been moving from one side of the canyon to the other. We decided they were laid up in certain pockets up higher where we couldn’t see them. We were about to head back so we could get to camp before dark when we spotted a goat straight above us at about 200 yards.

I wanted to take a goat with my bow. Brad and I had discussed that this was not going to be easy due to the terrain. After seeing everything involved and what it was going to take for us to be successful with a bow, I decided right then to lay the bow down and grab the rifle instead. I was going to try to take this goat on our first afternoon.

Often I hear horror stories about hunting this type of country. Your goat or sheep tumbles down the mountain, tearing itself up and breaking the horns. Thankfully, this was not the case. I chose a single-shot Thompson Center Encore in a 7mm Remington Mag. It’s hard to explain just how accurate this thing is! The goat stayed in position long enough for me to get a good solid rest. I shot almost straight up and dropped the goat in his tracks.

We started thinking about out how to get to the goat to bone it out, take the cape and get it back to camp. This proved to be more than we bargained for. Several times we stopped to scratch our heads wondering how in the world this goat ever got to the ledge in the first place.

Finally, it took some rope and mountain climbing skills for Randy and his assistant guide, Joel Bonick, to get to the goat. I wanted to be there to cape out my goat myself, but there wasn’t enough rope available so I simply had to stand below and holler encouragement from time to time. They did what they had to do and lowered themselves back down with the ropes while we waited below.

> We finally got it all together, packed the stuff on everyone’s backs and headed down to a trail leading through some pretty heavy timber to get back to camp. Hiking in this part of the country is amazing. You look down and realize that one false move, one rock moving the wrong way and you could be tumbling down the mountain and might not stop for a quarter of a mile. Mary was quite aware of this! We all had a big laugh as many times we were on both hands, both feet, and our behinds as we maneuvered down the side of the mountain.

Randy had issued headlamps to all of us. These proved invaluable on the trip back, as we had to walk about two hours in the dark. Without a good light we would have had to stop and camp because you couldn’t see where to place your feet and more than likely somebody would have gotten hurt.

If you have never made a trip like this, I can tell you that the food always tastes better out there and you just can’t ever seem to duplicate it. We had some hot stew and some great camp coffee when we got to camp. I assure you, we didn’t need any help falling asleep that night!

The next morning I couldn’t get Mary out of her sleeping bag for anything in the world. She was lying on snow and all she could see around her was snow. She was warm at that point and wasn’t about to risk having to get cold again. It wasn’t long before we had to break camp and get going back down the mountain.

It was an experience that Brad, Mary and I will not soon forget. I can say to anyone who has a desire to make a trip like this that you won’t be disappointed.