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Unit 36 NM Elk Spots/Recomendations

Hello I'm hoping to go Elk Hunting next year in Unit 36 - New Mexico - Its the 1st time I would be going over to Unit 36 - Any Hunters that have hunted that area before? From your guy's experience, is there any good spots you can recommend around that area - Thanks!

So do you have a crystal ball that told you that you will draw a tag...?

Nope, no crystal ball just a guy wanting a little help that's all - I don't know if I'm going to get drawn or not, but it would help to know just in case -

tough draw

Like I said I don't know if I'll get drawn or not. I'm not a Psychic that can predict the future.

I'm just looking for any advice/help from other hunters that have hunted that area that's all.

Just about anywhere. Make sure you're ready for some steep terrain. I've hiked and shed hunted in that unit and lets just say I was always going up or down, never flat.

Last yrs success was 24-30% Im having format issues but I believe Resident odds of drawing were around 25% and if your a Non res your odds are substantially lower. If I were you I'd be looking for OTC Colorado plan B spots before I started counting my NM 2015 chickens.

I am in Nogal, NM right now and have been hunting elk all week and the best advise I can give you is get a horse !!! If you plan on hunting the White Mountain Wilderness it is one of the roughest, steepest damn places I have ever hunted. The elk travel all over the unit just pick a canyon, they might be there that day or they might not. Trust me if you are not prepared for 36 it will seriously kick your butt !!

Jdee and Ohiohunter

Thanks for the tips!

Jdee I will try to do some scouting soon and go check out the place =) I've been looking at the NM Game and Fish Maps, but I don't see Nogal Canyon on the Public Land - Are we allowed to Hunt that area since its NM Forest?

I was raised in Ruidoso all my life I love the outdoors, the hiking, fishing, But I never went out towards Nogal - The Farthest I've gone is Around Sierra Blanca up towards Ski Apache and Bonito Lake area for camping - I was always in the town of Beautiful Ruidoso.

Jdee do you quarter your elk out in the field? or do you field dress it and carry with your horse?

We always quarter it out then pack it out on horses and walk out leading the horses or quarter it out and hang it in trees and go get some more horses, it depends on where a bull is killed .You can hunt any of the canyons around Nogal as long as they are Lincoln Forest or White Mt. Wilderness and not private. You being raised in Ruidoso then you know how steep and rugged the unit is. You can hunt it with out horses but like last week we rode up to the head of Littleton canyon and ran into a couple of guys that had spent several hours hiking up there. We talked for a few mins. and they said they were going to lay down for a while after that hike...We wished them well, kicked our horses and went looking for elk. Good luck.

We've ran into elk everywhere we go in that unit. The areas you mentioned are all good areas. Pick a canyon and go for it, we've found elk in almost every canyon we went into. Nogal canyon is where we always start, very thick and steep country. Good luck

have you made it there hunting?

Having lived in Roswell in the 90s, its been my first choice for almost 30 years. However, as a non resident, after the resident tag grab, I have only drawn a tag for 36 once in the past 19 years, and that was in the outfitter pool. It will likely be my first choice until I'm too old or too broke to try but the odds are so bad now, I may not ever draw a tag for the first unit I killed an elk in. I apply to NM as a wasted lottery ticket in the vain hope of getting back there. Can't help it. I know its a waste of money, especially now that I have to buy a general hunting license to apply, but its where I fell in love with chasing elk hunting with my bow.

Resident tag grab? Can you explain that one?

He's referring to the Quota revision a few years ago where things changed to the current 84%R / 10%Outfitter / 6%NR. I concur 6% for NR is pathetic. And 10% Outfitter is akin to welfare.

Trophyhill, He use to be a resident, now he is not and he likes to imply that residents are greedy tag grabbing SOB's.

Smarba, I believe it's 84-10-6 and 6 is still pathetic, most of us deplorable residents believe there should be only one NR pool.

My error mrelite, I revised the % in my post. I know Darrell and I believe he like other NR (and many residents) is unhappy with the way the final quota ended up. Largely because the Outfitter pool still held 10%, and we the residents voluntarily gave 6% for NR. My understanding is the way the bill was headed it was going to be 90% resident and 10% Outfitter.

Prior to this it was 78% resident / up to 12% Outfitter / up to 10% NR

Not to beat a dead horse, but most believed/hoped it would end up something like 90% residents / 10% NR. Or perhaps opposite what it did with something like 85% resident / 10% NR / 5% Outfitter.

The original intent was to increase tags for residents. But that resulted in a substantial detriment to the DIY NR.

Yes, I'm still grieving the loss of tags available to those of us who grew up in NM and now have very little chance of drawing tags. FYI I believe there is no "Fair" distribution of tags. Any time tag % are created or changed it is taking tags from one group and giving to another. Is it right or wrong? I believe neither, but it is always a taking from one and giving to another. That was my gripe back in the day and I'm still holding to it. Those who argued it was the "right" thing to do for residents wouldn't be honest and say they were taking tags from us for them because that sounds bad. In the end, the bottom line of the change meant the odds of drawing a tag for NM residents went up in a minuscule amount while the odds for all NRs and especially DIY NRs plummeted due to the change. I get the arguments about protecting a percentage of the tags for the "locals." However, you also should think that through. Does a Catron county resident deserve to have a better opportunity to draw Gila tag than a Bernalillo county resident? Its the same principle and yet something tells me hunters in Albuquerque would have a lot to say if that were pushed through the legislature.

Anyway, I know its water under the bridge and we aren't going back so I should have ignored it. However, sometimes its hard to not poke the bear every once in a while. Good luck to everyone in the draw. Someone has to hit the lottery, right?

Many have boycotted NM Darrell. There's always that option ;)

Any one who thinks a NM residents can draw tags easy doesn’t have a clue about what their talking about !! My last elk tag was 2013 and I’ve got friends without a tag going on 16 years . The great thing about NM is if you’ve got the money your going elk hunting... LO tags... if you don’t you bitch about guys that do.

I bitch , and will continue to bitch , about LO tags. Biggest racket in the West for elk hunting. Especially in New Mexico. Make those LO tags "ranch only" or take them away. Thats the only way you will have more opportunity to hunt as a resident or a NR.

I don’t agree with that ! If I don’t draw out again this year I have a LO tag on hold.. A 16 B tag at that . Without the LO tags it can be a LONG time in between elk tags here.

I have never said tags are easy for NM residents to draw, just that the % changes had only a minuscule effect on actual resident odds and a dramatic effect on DIY NR odds. However, if you haven't drawn since 2013 as a resident, you are either incredibly unlucky or you need to change your strategy. Your friends who haven't drawn in 16 years must only put hunts with incredibly low odds that would be even worse for any NR. For example, in 2019, unit 36 of this thread had a 17.2% resident draw odds for the first hunt, a 2.8% for DIY NR and 7% chance for the outfitter pool. So that means is that statistically speaking, you should draw this tag once every 6 years as resident, once every 35 years NR-DIY and once every 14 years in the guided pool.

The LO thing is definitely abused. I don't agree with allowing someone who owns a section of land in a unit to sell off a bull tag for $8k. That's about the going price in unit 34. Hard to blame him for doing it, but he's definitely benefiting far beyond the probability of elk on his place. They should at least make the landowner post that his property is open to elk hunting since he has to allow public hunters in exchange for the unit-wide tag. Currently, you would have to research it through G&F to know. Wonder if OnX would add that?

You can add them yourself manually, they're all on the dept web map. I suspect you could also call their gis dept and get an overlay to add to onx or google earth.

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