Bighorn sheep rams perform their iconic head-butting contests for dominance and access to eligible females each fall. Apparently, no one told these two.
They were caught in the act last Saturday, March 24 — months after the rut — by photographer Timothy Mayo on Miller Butte in the National Elk Refuge near Jackson.
Mayo was watching a bachelor herd of about 15 males bedded among the butte’s cliff bands when he noticed a smaller group of ewes approaching from above. The rams seemed disinterested until the females descended to their level, at which point “they just went crazy,” he said.
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Roughly half of the males stood and squared off among the cliffs, he said, creating the opportunity for Mayo to catch the action shot above.
Such off-season behavior isn’t all that unusual according to Steve Kilpatrick, executive director of the Wyoming Wild Sheep Foundation. “They will spar a bit year round,” he said “but the intensity is greatly elevated during the rut.”
Perhaps that’s why the ewes, seemingly unsurprised and unimpressed, simply kept walking.