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Flatlander

6 - 400” bulls - Can it be done?

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3 minutes ago, Flatlander said:

Thanks for posting the pic Tony. A google search didn’t yield me any results. 

It's been a while since I did that article, so I can't recall if the photo was provided to me by Amanda (she was the SCR biologist at the time) or by Bradley Joe, Shipsey's guide. 

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19 hours ago, Outdoor Writer said:

I was sorting through some tear sheets and came across this one of Mike Shipsey's bull that was used in the article I did on it. 

shipseyelk.thumb.jpg.49a46e0e8ac574181f08fa12e9dfbf8d.jpg

this bull and not the hunter should be recognized as the best ever.  i have seen replica mounts and have spoken w several who handled the rack.  this is our trophy, our top bull, the best wild-lands bull ever.   people have told me Shipsey is a great guy.  he did not do us any favors here in this great state and this bull should have been taken by someone else.  as far as i am concerned it is/was the finest wapiti ever in the milky way galaxy.  so far!

lee

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1 hour ago, biglakejake said:

this bull and not the hunter should be recognized as the best ever.  i have seen replica mounts and have spoken w several who handled the rack.  this is our trophy, our top bull, the best wild-lands bull ever.   people have told me Shipsey is a great guy.  he did not do us any favors here in this great state and this bull should have been taken by someone else.  as far as i am concerned it is/was the finest wapiti ever in the milky way galaxy.  so far!

lee

Why should it have been taken by someone else?

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All I have heard is rumors. At this point I don’t think anyone knows the reason the bull is not in the book or how many of the rumors about the man himself are true. Is he still alive, still hunt? 

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15 minutes ago, trphyhntr said:

All I have heard is rumors. At this point I don’t think anyone knows the reason the bull is not in the book or how many of the rumors about the man himself are true. Is he still alive, still hunt? 

I think his wife gifted him the tag and her name was on it is the reason they won’t let it in. Stupid

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4 hours ago, biglakejake said:

this bull and not the hunter should be recognized as the best ever.  i have seen replica mounts and have spoken w several who handled the rack.  this is our trophy, our top bull, the best wild-lands bull ever.   people have told me Shipsey is a great guy.  he did not do us any favors here in this great state and this bull should have been taken by someone else.  as far as i am concerned it is/was the finest wapiti ever in the milky way galaxy.  so far!

lee

At the time he killed the bull, there were two different rumors going around. I don't know if either of them had anything to do with B&C's decision. 

This is an excerpt from the Hunting Report:

….The lucky hunter, Mark (sic) Shipsey, says his hunt was paid for by Hunting Report subscriber Shirley Hayward, who grew interested in the San Carlos hunt after she read our reports about the elk potential there. Since Hayward paid for the hunt, she is owner of the trophy, Shipsey said at press time.....

Interestingly, San Carlos Reservation has never been as highly regarded by hunters as the adjacent White Mountain Apache Reservation. In fact, interest in San Carlos has been so slight of late that Hayward was able to pick up the Shipsey hunt for only $20,000. That’s half the stated minimum price of hunts in the Dry Lake Area. Asked why the hunt was sold so cheaply, Tribal Biologist Cecil Brown said there had simply not been enough demand for the hunt to sell it in the prescribed manner – that is, to the highest bidder above $40,000. “We were halfway through the season and the hunt hadn’t been sold. She offered $20,000 and we took it,” Brown said. 

And below is another excerpt from a magazine article. The incident took place in the 1980s.

The unscrupulous will stop at little to obtain this prize. One of the worst incidents occurred two decades ago near a campground parking lot at the Columbia Icefield in Jasper National Park, where Michael Shipsey, a millionaire hunter from California, shot a trophy ram on the highway with a pistol while his Canadian guide fed the sheep bread crusts. The guide was apprehended, spent 75 days in jail and paid a $5,000 fine. He lost his guiding licence and his hunting territory in British Columbia. In an international investigation coordinated by Jasper park warden John Steele, Shipsey was convicted in the United States on seven counts involving illegally killed game. He received a $14,000 (U.S.) fine, 40 days in jail and five years’ probation.

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28 minutes ago, trphyhntr said:

i saw him at the taxidermy once when i was a kid.  he was getting an elk rack that he had killed customized. 

I read something about that elsewhere. Maybe you mentioned this here once before?

He wanted the skull split to widen the spread and also wanted some length added to a few tines. 

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