Hunting in Western states

[Jereky]

Anyone have experience hunting in any western states without a guide? Just looking to gain some knowledge or information about applying for elk, pronghorn, mule deer or if it’s even a possibility without hiring a guide. Most states have points systems. I’ve read state websites and haven’t seen a lot of info pertaining to non-US citizens getting licences, just out of state residents.
Thanks in advance.

Jereky

[RobbieH]

Check out ‘the mindful hunter’ Jay Nichol on YouTube or his podcast. He’s addressed this topic specifically in detail. Can’t remember his handle here on HBC

[Blockcaver]

I've big game hunted in CO, WY , AZ, NE, KS, NV, OR, NM and TX without guides....all archery hunting and believe this is still possible in those states, American or Canadian, but haven't researched them recently. WY does have designated Wilderness Area guide requirements for any NR of the state.

Believe Alaska may have a guide requirement for a Canadian for all species...not sure. Brown Bear, Grizzly, Dall Sheep and Goat require a guide for NR of Alaska the last I knew.

License and Tags and Over-the-counter vs LEH will be very state and even management unit specific. Log into states regs and figure it out if interested.

[N¡ck]

Why would you do that when you live in BC?

[Blockcaver]

Nick, not sure who you directed the question to, but my commentary: All the states I mentioned probably have better deer hunting, whether whitetail or mule deer as applicable vs my experience in BC. Same goes for elk hunting. Generally they have "real" archery seasons, no night hunting, no or less wolves, more animals etc. Not to mention pronghorn hunting in some of the states and Coues Deer in AZ.

[N¡ck]

Is not most good hunting on private land in the south? Was more tongue and cheek comment.

[j270wsm]

Why would you do that when you live in BC?

better question is why wouldn’t you go south? When was the last time you hunted antelope? Depending on the unit, Alberta takes 8yrs+ or you could pay $5000-7000k to be guided. Guided mule deer in Alberta is $8000.
I started applying for antelope and mule deer in Wyoming a few yrs ago. Now that it looks like I’ll be able to travel again I’ll try to pull antelope tags for next fall. It costs me around $200 a yr to build points for my son and I. Depending on the unit I can draw an antelope tag every 1-2yrs in Wyoming and mule deer every 2-3yrs. This yr I’ll start applying for white tails in Kansas or Iowa. Plan is to apply for hunts so that I can go on a multi specie trip every 2-3yrs.

[j270wsm]

I use wta tags, they do everything for me. I tell them the state and specie I want to hunt and they send me the paper work to fill out. Right now I’m applying for points only, When it comes time to pull my tag I will tell them what kind of hunt I want…..archery/rifle, private/public land, mountain hunt/horse back/blinds/tree stand, guided/unguided, any animal or trophy animal….from there they will tell me which is the best unit to apply for. If/when your drawn they will give you all the contact info you need.

[Blockcaver]

Some of the states mentioned have huge amounts of public lands, US Forest Service, State Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management (BLM), State School Trust Lands open to hunting, State Land Board Lands, Municipal Water Shed Lands and likely others. I've hunted all of those I've mentioned, besides knocking on doors and getting permission. From "Summit Post" WY is 56% public, AZ 57%, CO 56%, NV is 88%, UT is 75%, ID is 70% etc. A few other sites list the numbers as slightly less, but there is a significant amount of public lands in the US.

[bighornbob]

I went down to Montana in 2000 i think for antelope. Drew a tag and a local took me out. Its till the same but drawing tags is a little tougher.

I started applying for preference points in Montana and Wyoming 2 years ago. Plan on going down in a few years and hitting both states and coming back with two antelope. Depending on where you go in those states you could almost guarantee a tag every year or every two year. Wyoming has a lot of private land so all the areas where you can draw a tag every year are pretty much 100% private so you would have to know someone or pay a tresspass fee. The more crown land hunts you are looking at 5-6 points to get drawn. The better the trophy potential may drive that up to 12 years in wyoming.

Once I have 5 points I will start looking, that should get me a ok area in wyoming with crown land and a real good area in Montana. But the antelope are really hammered by bad winters so an area that may only take 5 years to get drawn may become 10 years if there was a few bad winters.

Costs about $30-35 dollars for a point each year in each state.

No guides required.

BHB

[Jereky]

Thanks for all the great info guys. So I’m clear, can you just submit for points or do you have to buy a licence each year even if you don’t have intent to enter a draw that year. Also, how exactly does the points system work? You submit/buy/apply for points them once you accumulate enough you can enter a draw for a tag? I assume if that’s the case they have an odds system and you can see how many points you have to burn in the application for the tag? More points, better odds? I’m completely ignorant to this system. It seems to work in the states, would it work here in the interest of conservation and quality opportunity?

[Carbonmatrix]

I’ve hunting most of the western states and it’s pretty easy and much cheaper than driving up north and dealing with the natives and their ancestoral territories. Idaho you can get a guaranteed antelope, you just gotta apply as a 1st choice before June 5th. For elk Utah is otc, Colorado is otc, Idaho used to be otc for elk. You can just buy a point if you want in most states but you gotta front the cost of the license. I wouldn’t get in the point game tho, point creep is real and some of the coveted tags you will never draw because people have 25+ points or more and every year to draw it jumps a point or 2 higher, so you’ll never get a chance.

Try Colorado Utah or Idaho for otc, if you pay for the deer elk combo upfront try montana. If you want to play at draws try New Mexico or Idaho, there is no point system and everyone who is a non resident has equal chance to draw.

[Retiredguy]

I hunted a number of the western states in the past, but quit playing the drawing game down there as prices increased and the "points" systems morphed. After all there was lots of OTC hunting back here. With the way things are going here now opportunities are dwindling and there is nothing good on the horizon, so I think I will get back at applying in the US. In the end much of it is cheaper to hunt if you draw, especially if you need to fly in up north in order to get into GOS situations. All indicators are it is going to just get worse here, not better. I usually have very poor luck at drawing at home, so I think I am just going to be forced into applying in more draws south of the 49th in order to have some options...I hope.

[MOOSE MILK]

I hunted WY a few years ago and was amazed at how hunters were welcomed! Banners were hung across city streets "HUNTERS WELCOME" where do you see anything like that in Canada? Even the grocery stores and liquor shops had hunter-welcome signs out. Ya gotta love that...

In Casper, there is a mom-and-pop butcher shop that provides the best service you will ever see, drop off before five and pick up the following day all cut and wrapped to your specifications and flash frozen, at a very reasonable price. Try and find a service like that in BC.

And a bonus you can wear a shootin-iron on your hip, I shot a bunch of jackrabbits and my buddy took his antelope with his .44 revolver.

[twoSevenO]

I went down to Montana in 2000 i think for antelope. Drew a tag and a local took me out. Its till the same but drawing tags is a little tougher.

I started applying for preference points in Montana and Wyoming 2 years ago. Plan on going down in a few years and hitting both states and coming back with two antelope. Depending on where you go in those states you could almost guarantee a tag every year or every two year. Wyoming has a lot of private land so all the areas where you can draw a tag every year are pretty much 100% private so you would have to know someone or pay a tresspass fee. The more crown land hunts you are looking at 5-6 points to get drawn. The better the trophy potential may drive that up to 12 years in wyoming.

Once I have 5 points I will start looking, that should get me a ok area in wyoming with crown land and a real good area in Montana. But the antelope are really hammered by bad winters so an area that may only take 5 years to get drawn may become 10 years if there was a few bad winters.

Costs about $30-35 dollars for a point each year in each state.

No guides required.

BHB

why does that seem so easy? Don't these guys have a ton of pressure from hunters in other states?
I would imagine a lot of hunters from the eastern states and the south would also want to come up there and hunt, in addition to all the locals as well.

[bighornbob]

why does that seem so easy? Don't these guys have a ton of pressure from hunters in other states?
I would imagine a lot of hunters from the eastern states and the south would also want to come up there and hunt, in addition to all the locals as well.

yes lots of locals and from other states but sometimes lots of tags. The year I went to Montana I hunted region 7. It’s probably the size of our region 4 and 8 combined. That year they gave out 13,000 either sex tags for that area. Odds were 1:4 of getting drawn. Once they drew the 13,000 antelope they sent the winners a postcard for and additional 5000 doe and fawn tags on a first come first serve basis. You were allowed to buy two doe tags. Every local I ran into had three tags (basically one buck and two doe tags). Every camp had about 10 lope hanging or in coolers. It’s basically a social family meat hunt.

the thing in Montana is the government pays ranchers to provide access. They publish a book (the size of our hunting regs, maybe half the pages). That lists landowners that are willing to provide access and what they have. The guy that took me said you have to be careful as ranchers may list they have deer but they are never there during hunting or dry years. Hunters don’t know and sign up for that ranch and may never see a deer. Rancher still collects money from government. So like anything the better ranches get scooped up first. Also besides the hunting regs you have to follow ranchers rules. The ranch we hunted Said bucks only. Plus you were limited to certain pastures and only for three days so other hunters could hunt too. If there were pastures open you go there.

bouns is there is no cost to this so you could go to as many ranchers as you wanted too.

like you said lots of hunters in the states but like anything why drive through three states that have antelope to get to the fourth one. Also some hunters prefer to pay a trespass fee (usually $300 for three days) to avoid other hunters or to hunt better places. You will have less hunters and bigger bucks (usually) on ranches that charge trespass fees as it’s not a free for all. Just like here some hunters would prefer to pay the extra money for flyin hunt to avoid crowds and “better” game while the next guy says why pay when I can hunt the dirt roads around there for moose. Both types are successful.

BhB

[Rackmastr]

Headed down to Wyoming for second time. Wife drew a pretty top end antelope tag after a bunch of years of waiting and planning.

Should be a ton of fun!!!

I apply in AZ and WY. Lots of options out there though!!!

[RamMan]

I hunt in the Western US every year for elk and apply for points in all the states for bighorns, elk, and mule deer. If you have individual questions hit me up. I've hunted elk in Montana, Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico, and Idaho.

Every state is different with their systems but you can have a quality hunt every year for elk if you understand all of the states.

[twoSevenO]

yes lots of locals and from other states but sometimes lots of tags. The year I went to Montana I hunted region 7. It’s probably the size of our region 4 and 8 combined. That year they gave out 13,000 either sex tags for that area. Odds were 1:4 of getting drawn. Once they drew the 13,000 antelope they sent the winners a postcard for and additional 5000 doe and fawn tags on a first come first serve basis. You were allowed to buy two doe tags. Every local I ran into had three tags (basically one buck and two doe tags). Every camp had about 10 lope hanging or in coolers. It’s basically a social family meat hunt.

the thing in Montana is the government pays ranchers to provide access. They publish a book (the size of our hunting regs, maybe half the pages). That lists landowners that are willing to provide access and what they have. The guy that took me said you have to be careful as ranchers may list they have deer but they are never there during hunting or dry years. Hunters don’t know and sign up for that ranch and may never see a deer. Rancher still collects money from government. So like anything the better ranches get scooped up first. Also besides the hunting regs you have to follow ranchers rules. The ranch we hunted Said bucks only. Plus you were limited to certain pastures and only for three days so other hunters could hunt too. If there were pastures open you go there.

bouns is there is no cost to this so you could go to as many ranchers as you wanted too.

like you said lots of hunters in the states but like anything why drive through three states that have antelope to get to the fourth one. Also some hunters prefer to pay a trespass fee (usually $300 for three days) to avoid other hunters or to hunt better places. You will have less hunters and bigger bucks (usually) on ranches that charge trespass fees as it’s not a free for all. Just like here some hunters would prefer to pay the extra money for flyin hunt to avoid crowds and “better” game while the next guy says why pay when I can hunt the dirt roads around there for moose. Both types are successful.

BhB

Jesus Christ, how much game do these guys have down there?!?

Have you hunted mule deer down there? How is that? Not really interested in antelope, but for a big mule deer I might be inclined to make the drive ;)

[MOOSE MILK]

They have a hell a lot better game management than we do here in Canada.

[twoSevenO]

They have a hell a lot better game management than we do here in Canada.

for sure. They pour a significant amount of money towards it. And it shows ... i just didn't think they had THAT many more tags to hand out considering they have a lot more hunters as well.
Crazy.

[Retiredguy]

They have a lot of game. Last time I hunted in Wyoming for antelope I was seeing at least 300 mule deer every day and lots of whitetails in the creek bottoms. Sure the US has lots of people but with the draws that really is not an issue as the number of tags in the draw dictates what happens regardless of population. The only thing it affects is odds on drawing and, in most places they post the odds based on the year(s) prior so you can figure out which areas you are more likely to draw in.

There are also states that give landowners tags and you can get in on that by paying for one of the tags, either directly through the landowner of through an outfitter that has contracted with the landowner to run hunts with their tags. Some of the landowner tag hunts are very expensive and others are not. Here again you need to do your research, but they are an option that allows you to avoid putting in a draw. I plan to do this in New Mexico at some point for antelope.

With elk, I think few up here really get the picture of how many elk are in the western states. Some of the states have huge elk populations, with individual states that have more elk in the state than all of the wild free ranging elk in Canada.

Lots of options down there and it is a hunting resource that allows out of country hunters to apply and, if successful, hunt without a guide/outfitter. The key is to learn how the draws work in the states you want to apply in and do your homework on the areas you think you want to hunt in before you apply.

[Blockcaver]

Last I knew, CO had a quarter million elk... maybe 8 times what BC has. They were trying to knock the herd size back a bit so is likely lower now. They got wolves headed in, both migrating from WY (Yellowhead wolves from BC that were transplanted from BC to Yellowstone, WY) and about to start transplanting wolves (from somewhere?) after a ballot proposition to re-introduce them passed. Heyday for elk may be over. Tags are over-the-counter in some units and LEH in others, with the best units pushing to toward 30 preference points to draw. Archery either sex elk season was basically the month of Sept, crossbows not allowed. The 4 rifle seasons lasted 5 to 12 days each and a (very) limited LEH muzzleloader hunt ran for a couple weeks in Sept. You could only hunt one of of the seasons mentioned, although there were second antlerless tags in some units that you could rifle or archery hunt in addition to a primary bow, rifle or muzzleloader tag. Lots of opportunity!

CO mule deer herd was hurting with only about 130,000 (not up-to-date). All mule deer tags became LEH about a decade ago.

Sheep, goat and moose tags were really limited in number.

[bighornbob]

As others have mentioned each state has different rules and game numbers. Some bad and some pretty good depending on the species.

I know years ago I was scouring a US forum when all the Arizona guys were pumped that draws would be out soon. (like 20 times more pumped then here). I asked about the draws and what they could hunt without a draw as I told them up here we have draws but even without a draw tag I would be hunting sheep, moose and elk that fall. One of the guys said as a resident they can only hunt cougar and bear with a bow with out a draw tag. He put in for other species and applied for better hunts areas but he had not hunted deer in 8 years, elk in like 12 years and pronghorn for like 15 years. So some areas its hard to get a tag.

For sheep there are some areas that are point based draws and if you don’t start applying by the time you are 15 years old you will never see a tag in your lifetime. (i.e. states only give out 20 ram tags a year and there are 150 people with a max 30 points or something like that). Some hunters that are nerdy numbers guy even have a death rate for people thrown into their formulas to see how many of the people may die before they are drawn to increase odds for lower point holders. So some places and for some species its next to impossible to draw.

I recently got an email from the Foundation of Wild Sheep stating one of the states down south was going to vote on removing non-residents from draw system because it was so high for residents to get a tag. (Some states might allow up to 25% of the tags to go to non-residents). Imagine applying for a 12 years for a sheep draw as a non-resident, then the governor passes a law that only residents can hunt sheep. Im sure that will bring out some law suits.
So some states have a ton of game and others do not. Many hunters spend thousands each year applying for every game animals in maybe 10 western states, hoping they get drawn somewhere for something.
But has been mentioned the states spend a lot of money on its animals. In montana each region has its own species biologist. Where as here you have one or two bios managing all the animals in a region, where down there you will have a moose bio, elk bio, etc etc.

Years ago when I was looking for natural resource jobs I was looking in the states, and they would hire tons of summer students to use mist netting and catch song birds to figure out populations of wild birds in areas. There were hundreds of jobs every time I looked for studying this or catching that. Ask your local bio the last time the government up here did a count on say song birds in the area (inset laugh here). They might say they did an 4 hour helicopter flight looking at moose, deer and elk in one area 2 years ago.

It’s a different ball game down there.

[browningboy]

This really interests me as my sons coach has a ranch in Montana and he welcomes me to come down there to hunt or fish. I just have to read this thread again to understand how to apply and also everyone drive across border with guns?

[Retiredguy]

Bighornbob...ya, Arizona is probably the last state I would apply in unless you are playing the apply in every state game, which can get rather expensive. Drawing tags for Arizona's top game animals in good zones is a very long shot...everyone looking for monster elk, pronghorn, mule deer and desert bighorn knows about the big heads produced in this state and applies hoping to eventually draw.

There is no doubt that there is a lot of pushback developing in some of the states by residents who want to see less of the allowable harvest being given to non-residents and some have been pushing for NO non-resident hunters allowed in the draws, especially for coveted animals like desert bighorn, etc. that offer very few total allocations per year. I get it, but don't agree with it. That said I do think that residents should be entitled to the lions share of the allocations and non-residents should be held to 10% or some such percentage that can be agreed on.

One thing is for sure, as the years have gone by the draw regulations in some of the states have gotten more and more complicated and can be difficult for a lot of hunters to understand when they are not use to it.