Wyoming Elk General Region Draw: Surprises Inside!

Wyoming Elk General Region Draw: Surprises Inside!

By Jaden Bales

For nonresident Wyoming elk hunting hopefuls, there was a lot of speculation about how the tag draws would work for the new General elk regions. New in 2024, the elk regions were intended to replace the old statewide General license structure while allowing for Wyoming Game and Fish Department to better disperse nonresident pressure where the elk hunting opportunity is appropriate. 

For instance, the burgeoning east-side elk population offered more possible opportunity for nonresidents – especially those who can secure private land access. Conversely, the southern region for general elk hunting features a lot of resident and nonresident hunter pressure with plentiful public lands and no grizzly bears, so the license allocation was intended to slightly reduce hunter numbers there. The Western Region is a mixture of large backcountry wilderness areas and grizzly bear-thick elk hunting areas. Some of the Western Region is dominated by outfitted hunts for nonresidents while other parts of the region are good for the average big mountain DIY elk hunter. 

What happened in the 2024 nonresident elk draw? 

Going into the draw, one could have speculated whether the Western Region or Southern Regions would have gone for more or less points compared to one another. Many expected them to be about the same amount of preference points as the old General system, yet there were some surprises. 

First off, there was a significant disparity between Southern Region’s Regular and Special draw pricing. In the now nearly $2000 Special draw, it only took two preference points to guarantee applicants go hunting in the Southern Region. Meanwhile, in the Regular draw, it would take someone with greater than 5 points to guarantee they drew the Southern Region license this year. 

Over in the Western Region, the Regular Draw and Special Draw were much closer in drawing results. If someone had 4 preference points in the Special Draw, they still were not guaranteed a license, whereas someone with 5 or more preference points in the Regular draw could have had a guaranteed Western Region elk license. 

 

What would cause the disparity in one and not the other? 

Simply put, if you are a hardcore elk hunter who wants a stab at the biggest bulls in the state, you probably were more willing to apply in the Special to try and snag the Western Region than go with the Southern Region, where crowded elk hunting for raghorns dominates the headlines. 

Those hardcore elk hunters who applied in the Special draw in the Western Region probably are interested in looking for the rumored bigger bulls in this region or hiring an outfitter in the Wilderness portions of the Region for a classic horseback hunt in some of Wyoming’s most storied backcountry areas. 

The Snowy Range and Sierra Madres that hold the bulk of the elk hunting in the Southern Region are two of Wyoming’s largest elk herds and have some of the highest elk harvest year-to-year statewide. The average DIY person who just wants to fill the freezer with any elk they can come across, while not dealing with grizzly bears or big Wilderness is likely attracted to these areas. That is probably why Wyoming saw the highest preference point cost here in the lower-priced Regular draw than any of the other regions. 

While people who talk to nonresidents and/or advise in Wyoming elk hunts may have varied expectations for western and southern region outcomes, I will go out on a limb and suggest nobody expected the Eastern Region to go for as high of preference points as it did. The Special draw took 3 points to guarantee the draw, and the Regular took 5 preference points to guarantee the draw. 

Personally, I expected the Eastern Region to go for 2 or 3 points in the Regular and be a shoo-in for 1 point in the Special. This Region is dominated by large tracts of private land that the elk call home, and anyone with this license should have locked down a place to chase bulls long before putting the license in their pocket. There will be a few folks who figure out the small chunks of public land elk hunting in this Region, however, I would expect those small chunks to be busier this fall compared to previous years. 

With the change in Special license prices and new elk regions this year, a lot of the expectations going into this draw were an educated guess. While things will not be as big of a surprise in 2025, it’s still important for people planning General Region elk hunts in Wyoming to be patient as the predictability of these hunts stabilizes. I expect it will take another year at least before the expectations of the preference points needed to guarantee these hunts to level off, and that’s without additional major changes to the system.