Closing out my tur slam in the Caucasus

This article was first published in my email newsletter in October of 2026. I've added it to my website, because I think the information is useful in general, not just for the month it was published. If you'd like to keep up with the latest hunting information, including my open dates and available hunts, you can subscribe to my newsletter at the bottom of this page.

Last month I told you about the first two hunts of my trip to the Caucasus Mountains in southern Russia, and I didn't have much good to say about them, although they were ultimately successful. This month I get to tell you about the third one. It was a different experience from start to finish.

The whole three-hunt trip was built around the tur slam — the three species of wild mountain goat, called tur, that live in the Caucasus. They are the Dagestan tur, the Mid-Caucasian tur, and the Kuban tur. I already had the first two. The Kuban tur was the last one I needed.

INTO THE MOUNTAINS

I didn't start this hunt in the best shape. I'd picked up something from restaurant food in Makhachkala during the earlier hunts, and for several days I’d been having trouble keeping my food down. I was using some medication to avoid getting dehydrated, but it’s not how you want to start a mountain hunt. On the other hand, you don't travel halfway around the world to sit in a hotel room.

We flew into the regional airport at Mineralnye Vody and drove about four hours back into the mountains. It was a pretty drive, and it went right through a ski resort. Picture a Colorado mountain town in late summer and you've got it: hikers, backpackers, campers, road cyclists, mountain bikers, and people on roller skis (short skis on wheels) poling their way up the paved road and then flying back down.

At the end of the pavement, we switched to a four-wheel-drive vehicle for the last 45 minutes up to our base camp

THE BEST CAMP OF THE TRIP

This was the best camp I stayed in on the whole trip. It was made from four shipping containers set in a squared-off U, with the kitchen and dining area in the middle, my sleeping quarters on one side, the guides' quarters on the other, and the fourth container for storage. We were high, probably around 9,000 feet, in open, grassy alpine country, already at or above the treeline.

There were just three of us. My local guide was Yasharbek, who knew those mountains well and clearly had his act together. Taleh, who contracts with Profihunt, was my interpreter and second guide. Taleh is from Azerbaijan, and he speaks four or five languages, including Russian and more than enough English for us to understand each other.

After the problems with food on the first two hunts, I told them right away what I'd been dealing with. It was never an issue. The food was good, there was plenty of it, and anytime I wanted something, they were ready to fix it.

The weather was about as good as it gets in the mountains. Mornings ran 55 or 60 degrees, warm enough for a T-shirt when the sun was out and the wind was down. Clouds usually built up in the afternoon, which kept the highs around 75, and now and then we'd get a light rain.

DAY ONE: SETTLING IN

We got to camp late in the day, too late to hunt. We shot the rifle to make sure the zero had survived the trip, ate dinner, and got our gear ready for the morning.

A couple of shepherds were camped near us with a herd of sheep. Every morning, the sheep worked their way up the mountain to graze, and every evening they drifted back down. They’d be our neighbors throughout the stay.

DAY TWO: THE HUNT

After breakfast, the guides rounded up the horses, and we packed enough food and gear to stay out for three days. The horses were good ones: calm, sure-footed, and used to the mountains.

We rode up the valley past the hikers' tents and through the sheep. We were hunting the whole way, but realistically, we needed to get away from the people and the livestock before we'd find tur. When we reached the first ridgeline, the guides got off and spent a good while glassing before we dropped over the far side.

The country on the other side was steep, but the horses handled it without any trouble. Nobody was in a hurry. By then, I'd adjusted to the altitude and felt pretty good. We moved along at an easy pace, glassing carefully as we went. That's exactly the way you should hunt.

A few hundred yards below the ridge, we dropped into a small valley and set up a spike camp. We left our tent, sleeping bags, and most of the food there, keeping only enough for the afternoon. Then we eased up to a nearby saddle, peeked over, and started glassing.

We saw tur immediately, and the longer we looked, the more we found. But the first ones didn't look all that big to me, and the guides agreed: not mature enough.

So we kept going, following the ridgeline from one saddle to the next. At each one, we'd ride up just short of the top, get off the horses, ease up on foot, and glass the next valley. More tur, and more of the same verdict.

Near the end of the ridge, we did it one more time, and I could tell from the way the guides were reacting that they'd found one they liked. Taleh told me they figured he was about 11 years old, which for a tur is very old. He looked big to me, too, and he was bedded down inside of 400 yards.

I told them, "Let's do it." That's what we came for.

AGING A TUR

A tur's horns add a growth ring, called an annulus, every year, much like the rings in a tree trunk. If you're close enough and have good optics, an experienced guide can count those rings in the field and estimate the animal's age before you ever take the shot. That's how my guides knew this tur was an old one, and they turned out to be conservative.

THE SHOT

I got set up, reconfirmed the range, dialed the turret for the distance, and checked everything a third time. Then I told the guides I was about to shoot, so they'd be watching the tur when I fired.

He was lying in his bed, awake but relaxed. When I took the shot, the thermals rising up the mountain pushed my bullet a little high. It was still a lethal hit, but it wasn't where I wanted it, and he jumped up out of his bed. I reloaded and got back on him in a second or two, but by then he was already stumbling and going down.

That's when the steepness of those mountains came into play. On grass that steep, he didn't just fall. He slid and rolled several hundred yards down the mountain.

GETTING HIM BACK

Now we had to go get him, and that's no small thing at that altitude, on that slope. Yasharbek went back for the horses so we wouldn't have to walk as far, and Taleh and I started working our way down and around.

It was late morning by then, but it was cloudy, so the sun hadn't burned off the dew, and the grass was slick. On a slope like that, you take your time. I leaned on my walking stick with every step.

When we got around to him, he was still above us on the slope. Taleh asked if I wanted to climb up and get him. I said that if Yasharbek could do it, that would be a whole lot better. That was certainly the case: when he got there, he scooted across that slope like it was nothing. He slid the tur down the grass, then worked it down the last 50 to 100 yards, where it got really steep and the tur slid some more. It ended up in the creek at the bottom.

That's when we got a good look at him, and the guides were ecstatic. He wasn't 11 years old. He was 13, a very old tur and a very big one. I never dreamed I'd take a Kuban tur that size.

We skinned and quartered him. Nothing went to waste; the guides would take the meat home to eat. I kept the cape and horns for a shoulder mount.

BACK TO CAMP

We loaded everything on the horses and rode back over the saddle to the spike camp. The guides offered to make lunch, but I figured that by the time we'd cooked and eaten, we could be most of the way back to base camp. So we had some snacks and water while we repacked the horses and headed down.

When we got back into the valley, the sheep were there again, and so were the shepherds. They were all friends of my guides, so we stopped to visit for a while. I don't speak Russian, so I mostly listened, but it was a fine way to spend part of an afternoon.

Back at camp, we ate right away, and then Yasharbek went to work on the cape: skinning out the face, turning the ears, lips, and eyes, and salting it all down so it would arrive in the U.S. in good condition. He did an excellent job.

TWO DAYS RELAXING IN CAMP

With my tur down, I could have headed back to town early. Instead, I asked if I could stay in camp until it was time to leave. I'd get more rest, and I'd be eating food I knew was good. They were happy to have me.

Day three was a lazy day. The morning was sunny, so I bathed in the cold creek next to camp. I take ice baths at home anyway, so it felt great. I went for a walk around the area. Then, when the clouds rolled in and it cooled off, we spent the rest of the day in the kitchen, drinking tea and visiting as best we could while Yasharbek finished the trophy work, skull-capping the horns. 

On the morning of day four, I bathed in the creek one more time while Yasharbek shod some horses for the shepherds. Then, with no particular rush, we packed up and drove off the mountain.

THE LONG WAY HOME

Getting home took about as long as the hunt and wasn’t as much fun.

The highlight (so to speak) was a Ukrainian drone attack on Moscow while I was trying to get a flight out. That shut down the airport. The official word at the airport was that the airspace was closed because of a drone ‘threat’. When my flight finally took off and I landed in Istanbul (missing my connection), I learned the whole story — the ‘threat’ was something like 300 drones, maybe thirty of which got through. That’s pretty ‘threatening’, for sure.

Anyhow, I had to spend a night in the airport in Istanbul, waiting for my rebooked flight to Houston. In Houston, the baggage claim conveyor was out-of-service for an hour or more, so it was about midnight when I finally got through customs and out of the airport. Then I had a middle of the night, multi-hour drive home. It was pretty exhausting.

A GOOD WAY TO END IT

After two hunts that were pretty poor (although successful), this one gave me everything I'd hoped for: a good camp, good guides, good food, and a 13-year-old Kuban tur that completed my tur slam. I could have done without the drones over Moscow. But other than that, it was the right way to end the trip.