| EUROPEAN
MOUFLON - Ovis ammon musimon - Mufflon - Wildschaf - Muflon
Hunting season is open: 1st Sept. to 28th
Feb.
The best period is the rutting season, which takes place from middle
of October until the middle of November.
Hunting style:
- Individual – stalking, which is a real challenge
* For your tailor-made
package price, please Email us! *
Suggested calibers: .270 W, 7x57, .308, .30-06
or similar
Description
Origin
The European Mouflon is a species of wild sheep and as such is one
of the Caprinae or "goat antelopes". It is thought to
be one of the two ancestors for all modern domestic sheep breeds.
They originated in Southwest Asia, where they are now extinct, and
were introduced to the islands of Corsica, Sardinia, and Cyprus
during the neolithic period, where they naturalized to the mountainous
interiors of these islands over the past few thousand years. They
are now rare on the islands, but have been successfully introduced
into central Europe, and Hungary.
Habitat
Ovis ammon musimon lives in lightly wooded areas with plenty
of undergrowth on the middle slopes of mountains. The flock is mainly
sedentary, traveling no further than necessary to find grazing areas.
Physical Description
The European Mouflon is red-brown with a dark back-stripe, a light
colored saddle patch and light underparts. The males are horned
and the females are horned or polled.
The ears are short and pointed, with a tuft of hair at the tip.
The neck is short and strong, the trunk thickset, with a straight
ridge line sloping down at the back. The legs are slender but sturdy
and have a pear-shaped outline, with the small side toes lying flat
from the two-toed narrow hooves. The males have horns 12 to 75 inches
long and the females have horns 4 to 12 inches long. The face of
an adult becomes paler with age, and as the horn size of O.
a. musimon increases, its hair-like coat and body colors become
less showy.
Being the smallest wild sheep, the male has an average length of
110-130 cm, a height of 65-75 cm, and a weight of 25-55 kg. Females
are one-quarter to one-third smaller than the males. The female
sheep tends to resemble female goats.
Behavior
At birth, a lamb weighs about 5 to 10 percent of its mother's weight.
It is born fully developed and able to stand and nurse unaided within
a few minutes after birth. Ewes with good mothering instincts immediately
start licking the lamb and guide the lamb to the milk-filled udders
for nursing. This instinct is crucial for the survival of the lamb.
Nursing lambs wiggle their tails to stimulate the mother to sniff
their anal region. Ewes first recognize their lambs by smell, but
later on the ewe can tell lambs apart by their looks and voices.
As lambs grow older, the closeness between mother and offspring
diminishes, and in a few months it disappears.
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