Draw tags

[Chesapeake]

Hello all. I'm new, I just wandered in the other day. Have no idea how I never found this place before. I live in Washougal (Vancouver area) and hunt mostly Klickitat for deer and elk. I do make the annaul trip to the wilderness for the high buck hunt.

Intro aside. I have put in for the Desert tag in the past and now have 5  points. I've always known of the Entiat tag but having never seen the area was reluctant to put in for it. Last summer I made a trip up that way (disguised as an aniversary getaway to Levenworth) and drove alot of the roads giving it a look. I liked what I saw.

So my question is: Should I start putting in for Entiat, and possibly other units, or just hold out for Desert?

Are any of you guys willing to give your opinions of what tags a guy should be putting in for? I understand if not.

I'm not much of a trophy hunter, but have a personal goal to have a nice muley, whitetail, and blacktail mounted on the wall.

Guess I should mention I hunt muzzleloader and rifle, but tend toward rifle for deer.

[Ellensburg]

You could be holding out for a LONG time... There are definately 4 units in the state worth putting in for every year in my eyes where you have a great chance at a big buck. Even more than 4. Look for units that have been closed in the past and are now draw only. Entiat is a great tag.

[Chesapeake]

I guess my big hangup is I havent seen alot of these places so have no idea of what public access land is available, and whether it holds animals or not.

Entiat and Desert are faily easy in this regard. They have alot of public access land that the critters use.

[Ridgerunner]

Most guys aren't going to spill their guts on the late draw areas, they are all tough to draw and getting tougher each year.  I would get a gazatter and start looking at the unit boundaries for each of the units, you'll find most have good public access.  If you want a nice buck then there are a few units I would probably avoid but any of the late units are capable of producing a nice mature animal.

[Chesapeake]

Yep, kinda figured guys wouldnt want to give up too much, but I though I would ask.

[crabcreekhunter]

My two bits.  You don't need us for advice as far as which units are good.  A trophy buck can be killed in all of them in the amount of hunt time allotted.  Look at the WSFW site and see how many hunters are applying for a certain draw.  The Desert and Entiat get alot of atention.  This doesn't mean they will produce automatically.  The Methow ( Sin, Alta, Perr, Gard) used to be the target.  Now it has shifted south to Chelan County (Ent, Swak,Chiwa,Mission,Desert,Yak Center).  Expect to see the upper units start producing big heads now that the Tri-Pod fire produced new habitat.  It's kind of like fishing, about the time the word gets out that a lake is on fire, the smart guys have been catching them for a few years already.  Pick an area and stick with it for a few decades.  Eventually you may score big.  You also don't need late season permits to score big once you learn the habits of a certain area.  Once you decide on  units, start learning them today.  The habits of November deer aren't learned in September and October.  December deer aren't learned in October and November.  Like James Stewart's Dad, and Ricky Carmichael's Mom said, " A motocross race is raced on Sunday, but won on Monday."  I will say," Do not measure your trophys by the tape, but by how hard you worked for them."  I covet some of my smaller racks more than the big ones.  Memories of working towards your goal are real, the goal may not become real.  Covet the chase.  Eventually all memories of you, me, and all others will be washed away like tears in the rain when we pass.  Your big racks will be left for future generations to admire and challenge themselves to acquire.

[Chesapeake]

I'm thinking I should have worded my question a little differently.

I'm not asking what units are good from a trophy standpoint. I've done alot if not all of the online type research a guy can do. I can look over areas on Google earth, I have USGS topo's and maps ect...... I've looked at the draw statistics, harvest numbers, success rates, and I've scoured the internet gleaning info from magazine articles and outfitter web sites. But in the end I'm just a guy in front of a computer with a daunting amount of ground I realy should drive up, hike in and take a look at. I would also love to have the time to sleep with and pattern these bucks. But the reality is I live 4-5 hours away and work for a living so my play time is limited. I've atleast looked over the Desert and Entiat units to the point I'm confortable putting in for those tags. But I dont even know where to start for any of the other 200 series units.

The kind of answer I was hoping for was something like: Entiat has alot of national forest land and some areas where a guy could put some distance between himself and a road. You might start your scouting in the NW corner of the unit. Swakane has decent deer numbers if the snow pushes them down, but the public land is pretty well blanketed with logging roads that are all drivable so you will have to deal with road hunters.

Something along those lines anyway.

Thanks for the help thats bean given!

[WDFW-SUX]

Perrygin

Chewuck

Gardner

Alta

Chiwawa

Cilliwist

Pouge

Swakane

Entiat

Desert

Teanaway

Alkali


Any of those units have huge bucks in them they all have huge tracts of public land you just have to draw a tag.

[Ridgerunner]

I think that you really can't go wrong with any of them.  I would just pick a couple more that are intriguing and put those down, then when you draw you can learn the units.  It is my experience though the farther south you are and the closer to the mountains you are the less open the units are, for example Mission and Chiwawa are much more heavily treed than the entiat.  Now there are some open areas but there are considerably less of those than the other Chelan county units from what I've seen. I would imagine that Okanogan county has similar type units but I'm not familiar with those except I know that Perrygin is similar to the Entiat in make up of primarily wintering range, so if you like Entiat you will probably like the Perrygin as well.

[Chesapeake]

Thanks Ridgerunner, you've bean helpfull. I think I will have to hit the maps and put some miles on the rig to get up there and give it a better look.

[spin05]

I  think  theses  guys  are  trying  to  steer you  away  from  entiat and  desert  hahahahahahahahahahah  one  less  guy  out  many  thousands  ..............I  personaly  put  in  for  nothing  less then  entiat or  desert.  But  i  hunt  archery  so  we  have  way  less choices.

[Chesapeake]

I  think  theses  guys  are  trying  to  steer you  away  from  entiat and  desert  hahahahahahahahahahah  one  less  guy  out  many  thousands  ..............I  personaly  put  in  for  nothing  less then  entiat or  desert.  But  i  hunt  archery  so  we  have  way  less choices.

I didnt get that out of thier posts. Desert will still be #1 and Entiat will most likely occupy #2, its choice #3 and 4 I'm looking to add if I can locate and scout something else I like.

[jackelope]

there are great bucks in all those units. alls anybody ever talks about is the entiat or the desert.
look through past posts on here and you'll find other units people are pulling big bucks out of. don't expect anybody to tell you which rock to sit on, but you'll see looking at others talk on this site that there's more to washington than just the entiat  and the desert.

[andrew_12gauge]

What ever happened to the quilomene anyway is it still producing bigger bucks?

[spin05]

Well  there is  chiwawa unit.Years ago slide ridge and gardner were the s**t before anybody knew about entiat or dessert..........