Special Permits Points and Chances

[Giggles]

Someone please set me straight with the special permits point system and my chances! I'm bowhunting for elk this year as a disabled vet and plan to submit applications for the disbled hunter permits in the mudd flow area and maybe some other special permits as well. I have only purchased a hunting license twice before (1 gun and 1 bow) and applied for a cow permit once. Do I have any points, and what may my chances be of drawing any kind of tag? I've been told that I may stand a good chance at the disabled hunter tag due to not may disabled hunters actually bowhunt.         

[bobcat]

What year did you apply for the cow elk hunt? That will make a difference on which categories you have points, or actually 1 point. You will only have 1 point if you have only applied one time. If that was in 2009 or before, then you will have 1 point in all the elk permit categories. If you applied in 2010 or 2011, then that 1 point will only be in the category in which you applied. Confused yet?

Those elk permits in the disabled category actually look relatively difficult to draw. Odds are worse than 1 in 100. Pretty bad, especially if you only have 1 point. Is it the bull hunt or the cow hunt you're interested in? (or both?)

[Giggles]

I was thinking both of those and maybe the Margaret area.

[bobcat]

The problem is, there are not any disabled hunter permits that require only an archery tag. If that were the case, I'd say you'd have good odds. But those Mudflow permits can be applied for with any tag. You might be better off looking in the Bull category and the Antlerless category, and applying for the permits that require you to have an archery tag. Those would very likely have much better odds.

[bobcat]

Here's a good one to try for: the Toutle "any bull" archery permit in the Quality elk category. Odds of 1 in 20. That's way better than either of the Mudflow permits in the disabled category.

Also, the Margaret "any bull" archery permit in the Bull category, AND the Toutle antlerless archery permit in the Antlerless category. That one has odds of 1 in 12. Way better than 1 in 100. You might actually have a chance, even with only 1 or 2 points.

[Chesapeake]

Bobcat, I don't believe the odds fall out quite like you imply. It sounds like your going off the number of tags compared to how many applicants for last year.
Besides the obvious that this years applicants could vary greatly, I believe the "last years applicants" figure doesn't take into account the number of points of each applicant.
I think the best you could reasonably do is multiply in the "average points to draw" figure against the "last year apps" and come up with an estimate of draw odds.

But yeah, the Tutle tag looks like decent odds.

[Chesapeake]

Calculating your 1 point turning to 2 points against the average of 6 points looks to get you about 1 in 60 odds.

[CP]

The best you can do is take an educated guess based on last year’s numbers.  Hunt #2608 – Mudflow disabled any bull has 4 permits and last year 507 applicants, average of 9 points.

9*9*507 = 41,067 names in the hat if you will.  If you have 2 points this year, your odds will be about (2*2*4)/41,067 = 0.04% or 1 in 2567 or basically a snowball’s chance in hell.

Sorry for the bad news, but that’s the math of it.

[Chesapeake]

Toutle cow and Toutle quality look like you best odds. Then margaret cow. Wynoochee cow will probably pan out well. The rest of the WA draw odds look to be less than 1% chance of a tag.
My strategy is to fill the # 1,2,3 picks with hunts you dream of. Then put down a possible draw for the #4 pick.
If they pull your number they just go down your list and give you the first hunt with a tag available. IF there are any tags left when they pull your name. You want the most desirable hunts first on your list.

[bobcat]

Bobcat, I don't believe the odds fall out quite like you imply. It sounds like your going off the number of tags compared to how many applicants for last year.
Besides the obvious that this years applicants could vary greatly, I believe the "last years applicants" figure doesn't take into account the number of points of each applicant.
I think the best you could reasonably do is multiply in the "average points to draw" figure against the "last year apps" and come up with an estimate of draw odds.

But yeah, the Tutle tag looks like decent odds.

I realize dividing the number of applicants by the number of permits doesn't give the true odds, but it's a good way to compare hunts and give you a general idea of the difficulty in drawing a particular permit. Especially when you're someone with only 1 or 2 points. The "average points" number is really meaningless, especially for hunts for which there are only a few permits. I think you know that, since it seems like you stated just that in another thread.

[Chesapeake]

Oh yeah I know. Statistically you probably couldn't ever figure the true odds. They do a random assignment and then random draw for your order in line. You would have to calculate your odds of getting in line at a given point. Then you would have to calculate the odds that everyone in front of you in line wouldn't consume all the available tags for the hunt you want. Maybe some math wiz could figure it out, but I can tell  you it would be long odds.

From experience I tend to draw tags about like the ones were talking every 2 to 3 years. But that was before the new system. Back then I didn't have to compete with the guys chasing bull tags.

[Chesapeake]

Honestly your way of estimating is probably fine. With the new. System I'm trying to figure in how many points folks are playing with. But I have no way to know how it will pan out. I expect the average points for a lot of the draws to drop off as the system settles out.

[D-Rock425]

I don't know why but I always thought the average points was the average points of the successful applicants.

[bobcat]

I don't know why but I always thought the average points was the average points of the successful applicants.

It is, but that doesn't tell you anything about your odds of drawing.

[Antlershed]

If you really wanted to take the time to calculate the odds, you can go the WDFW site and see how many points each person had that applied, then you could figure out how many "names" were in the hat