http://www.backcountrychronicles.com/elk-harvest-comparison-western-states/Elk Harvest Comparison of Western States 2012 – 2016
bull elk game camera photo
Photo taken with Moultrie Game Cam. Click on photo for larger image.
I live in the Inter-mountain West and can hunt elk every year with Over-the-Counter (OTC) tags, but constantly keep track of harvest data in other western states for out of state elk hunts.
I gathered data from the state harvest reports to compare the elk harvest data from all western states that still have OTC elk tags.
At the beginning of the New Year (2018), the most up to date harvest data is from the 2016 hunt seasons. This page was originally started in 2012 and has been been updated every year and now includes elk harvest data for each year since 2012.
New tables include Total Elk Harvested, Total Bull Elk Harvested, Total Hunters and Hunter Success.
I originally kept track of the elk harvest from 11 Western States, but now only keep collect harvest data from seven Western States that still have Over-the-Counter (general season) elk hunts; Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Utah, Washington and Wyoming.
Five of these states (Colorado, Idaho, Oregon, Utah & Washington) still have OTC tags available for non-resident hunters.
I dropped Arizona, California, Nevada and New Mexico. because these states only offer limited entry elk hunting (except for a very limited number of OTC tags in Arizona).
Table 1. Total Elk Harvested in 7 Western States with OTC Tags 2012 – 2016
State 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 AVG
Colorado 43,490 43,606 41,900 44,852 39,306 43,631
Wyoming 26,365 25,968 25,905 24,749 25,852 25,768
Montana 20,550 20,154 25,735 30,924 24,532 24,379
Idaho 16,028 16,231 20,088 23,836 21,326 19,502
Oregon 17,455 16,596 18,772 18,707 17,446 17,795
Utah
16,332 16,879 17,133 19,294 NA 17,410Washington
9,162 7,246 6,966 7,829 6,796 7,600Note: Table 1 is ranked by highest average total elk harvested to lowest. Total Elk include Bull Elk and Antlerless Elk, which includes all cows and calves, from all general (OTC) and limited entry (controlled) hunts for all weapons.
Most Elk are Harvested in Colorado
Colorado always has the largest total elk harvest every year (Table 1) and also has the most bull elk harvested (Table 2) and has averaged over 43,000 total elk and just under 22,000 total bull elk each season.
Colorado should have the largest elk harvest because it has the largest elk population, but there were also twice as many hunters in Colorado as any other state (the average is now over 219,000 – Table 3).
In fairness, Colorado has lots of different seasons, so the hunting pressure is spread out. Overall hunter success in Colorado is 5th placed at 19.4% (Table 4).
Table 2. Total Bull Elk Harvest in 7 Western States 2012 – 2016
State 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 AVG
Colorado 22,208 22,766 22,435 22,558 19,997 21,993
Montana 10,452 10,446 13,142 13,703 11,089 11,766
Wyoming 11,649 11,276 10,976 10,949 12,339 11,438
Oregon 10,963 10,801 12,065 11,598 11,054 11,296
Idaho 9,476 9,355 11,309 13,111 12,386 11,127
Utah 7,683 8,131 7,659 8,090 NA 7,891
Washington 4,945 4,075 3,838 4,467 4,074 4,280
Note: Table 2 is ranked by highest average total bull elk harvested to lowest. Bull Elk include all Antlered Elk including Spike Elk if the state keeps separate records and includes all general season and limited entry hunts for all weapons.
Wyoming and Montana Ranked 2nd and 3rd for Elk Harvest
I call Wyoming and Montana 2nd tier elk hunting states (for overall elk numbers), with total elk harvests ranging between about 20,000 to 30,000 for the 2012 – 2016 hunt seasons.
The average number of elk harvested is very similar between Wyoming (ranked 2nd), just ahead of Montana in the range of 24 – 25,000 total elk harvested.
As for total bull elk harvested, Montana ranks 2nd (average just under 12,000 bull elk) and Wyoming ranks 3rd after the 2016 harvest.
Idaho has ranked with both Wyoming and Montana the past two years for total bull elk harvest, but the 5 year average still ranks behind Oregon.
In this “2nd Tier” group, Montana has averaged the most hunters (over 109,000) followed by Oregon and Idaho. Wyoming has the least number of hunters of all seven states with an average of only 58,100 elk hunters per season.
Wyoming claims an amazing overall 44.4% average hunter success rate (includes OTC tags), followed now by Utah at 26.2% (pending the 2016 harvest data). Idaho dropped to third place followed by Montana.
Note: Wyoming only has OTC tags available for residents and Montana has gone to a draw for Non-residents (but almost everyone still draws). Colorado and Idaho have thousands of OTC tags available for non-residents.
Table 3. Total Elk Hunters in 7 Western States 2012 – 2016
State 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 AVG
Colorado 215,326 219,166 217,769 221,274 223,745 219,456
Montana 102,861 107,568 107,663 113,959 113,577 109,126
Oregon 103,176 106,639 106,982 106,884 104,216 105,579
Idaho 83,693 88,978 96,220 103,207 101,805 94,781
Washington
67,950 68,572 66,606 68,012 63,557 66,939Utah
59,175 66,374 69,503 71,175 NA 66,557Wyoming 57,331 57,785 58,266 58,959 58,159 58,100
Note: Table 3 is ranked by highest average Number of Hunters to lowest.
Idaho, Oregon and Utah Elk Harvest Ranked 4th, 5th and 6th
Idaho, Oregon and Utah are third tier elk hunting states. They were fairly close for the total number of elk harvest with all three states averaging between 17,000 – 19,000 total elk harvested in the last four or five years.
Oregon and Idaho have averaged about 11,000 bull elk and Utah has averaged about 8,000 bull elk harvested each season.
Oregon averages nearly 106,000 elk hunters each season (3rd highest), Idaho has averaged 94,000 and while hunters in Utah are increasing, the four year average has only been about 66,000 hunters (2nd lowest).
In this group, the success rate is lowest in Oregon at 16.8% (6th place overall), and hunter success in Idaho averages 20.9%. That makes Utah look pretty good with a 26.2% success rate (4th place) and all three of these states issue thousands of OTC tags. Elk Populations in Utah are still growing, so look for lots of antlerless tags to be issued in the future.
Table 4. Elk Hunter Success in 7 Western States 2012 – 2016
State 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 AVG
Wyoming 46.0% 44.9% 44.5% 42.0% 44.5% 44.4%
Utah 27.5% 25.4% 24.7% 27.1% NA 26.2%
Montana 20.0% 18.7% 23.9% 27.1% 21.6% 22.3%
Idaho 19.2% 18.2% 20.9% 23.1% 22.5% 20.9%
Colorado 20.0% 19.9% 19.2% 20.3% 17.6% 19.4%
Oregon 16.4% 15.6% 17.5% 17.5% 16.7% 16.9%
Washington 13.5% 10.6% 10.5% 11.5% 10.7% 11.4%
Note: Table 4 is ranked by highest average Hunter Success to lowest.
Washington Elk Harvest Ranked 7th
Washington State is a 4th tier elk hunting state, but Washington still offers many OTC tags, so there is a better chance to hunt elk in Washington than in Arizona, California, Nevada and New Mexico combined.
Hunters have harvested between 7,000 and 9,000 elk each season in Washington (2012 – 2016) and have harvested between 3,800 and 5,000 bull elk.
Washington has averaged about 68,000 elk hunters per season, which is more than Utah and Wyoming. Hunting elk in Washington must be tough since the overall harvest success is only 11.5%.
Days of Hunter Effort per Elk Harvest
I’ve started including a new metric that is used by a few states (Wyoming) that I think is a useful compromise between a hunters chances of finding elk and hunter density, and that is the number of hunter days per elk harvest. It is simply the total number of days all hunters spent in the field divided by the total number of elk harvested.
Obviously, all hunter days in the field are not equal. Some hunters climb the highest mountains and hike many miles into the backcountry and others play pocket pool most of the day at camp, but this is a fair representation of how much effort the average hunter will spend to kill an elk.
Table 5. Elk Hunter Effort to Elk Harvest in 6 Western States 2012 – 2016
Numbers represent the number of Hunter Days per Elk Harvest and the table is ranked by the average days from low to high.
State 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 AVG
Wyoming 17.6 17.8 19.2 19.5 18.3 18.5
Utah 19.2 20.8 21.5 20.3 NA 20.5
Colorado 25.5 25.4 27.6 25.9 30.0 26.8
Oregon NA 38.6 34.6 NA NA 36.5
Montana 43.2 45.7 36.7 33.9 43.5 39.9
Idaho 55.8 57.9 51.2 44.8 27.8 46.4
Remember these data are from all weapons and all seasons (general and Limited) combined. Wyoming comes out on top with a five year average of 18.5 hunting days per elk harvested. Utah is in 2nd place with a four year average of 20.5 days per elk harvest.
Colorado is in 3rd place with 26.8 days per harvest and Oregon, Montana and Idaho bring up the rear with 36, 39 and 46 days per harvest.
Washing State is not included because they do not provide hunter effort in their harvest reports. Oregon usually does not provide that data, but I found hunter recreation days for two years in 2013 and 2014, so I used it.
This is obviously related to hunting success, but it puts the amount of effort it takes for the average hunter to harvest an elk.
If harvest success is 20%, that also means 1 hunter out of five harvested an elk. Or it would take five seasons for everyone to get an elk (on average). How many days is five seasons? That depends on the state and the type of hunt, but knowing the average number of days per harvest puts it in perspective.
I know what you’re thinking. Surely we can do better than average. If it takes the average hunter 20 – 40 days to get an elk, we can do it in half that amount of time (10 – 20 days).
I’ll bet you’re right.
