Caribou Gear

NM Draw Apps Open 22

RESIDENTS usually go years between draws. Too many tags to big landowners who turn around and sell them to outfitters. Now, technically, those landowner tags go to "residents", but the bulk of those tags go NR via the outfitter.
Residents have cow tags, and quite a few very high odds bull hunts they could put as a third choice. There are NUMEROUS 100% draw odds muzzle loader bull hunts, multiple 100% draw odds rifle bull hunts, a 64% hunt I’d really like to go on. Deer are similar. At the resident price and relatively short drive, some of those opportunity hunts are a lot more appealing. I don’t think residents have nearly as much to complain about as NRs. If you’re not hunting reasonably often as a resident you’re being picky.

As a NR, there aren’t many rifle elk hunts with draw odds over 10%, and when they get much better than that(with any weapon type), those aren’t the hunts NM is known for. I’d have a REALLY hard time driving through CO to hunt some of those. Deer odds are better, but I’ve been on some pretty terrible deer hunts in NM.

Landowner tags exist to compensate the landowner for damage the elk do to their crops etc. It’s technically still legal for landowners to shoot them for depredation, and it wasn’t that many years ago that a lot of land owners shot them up royally. An elk or two is a beef that ranch can’t support, and I hate to think of how much damage elk can do to alfalfa. You have more elk because those landowners tolerate them, and because some of them are growing alfalfa. Has the price those tags sell for gone so high that they are making a lot more money than damage? Probably. Does the system get abused? Yeah. Do I have a problem with the e-plus system in general? Nope.
 
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NM is horrible,don't bother applying. Odds are against you. LO are bad...lol.

Let's see,6 bull tags a cow in 12 years as a R. Hunted LO tags the other years except 1. 1 time in 12...
My deer draws have not been good overall,and neither have the deer numbers.
 
Residents have cow tags, and quite a few very high odds bull hunts they could put as a third choice. There are NUMEROUS 100% draw odds muzzle loader bull hunts, multiple 100% draw odds rifle bull hunts, a 64% hunt I’d really like to go on.

Just curious if you're pulling these odds from GoHunt?

There are definitely some lower quality hunts that are easier to draw and a few that saw 100% of resident applicants draw as a first choice last year, but those generally involved burning your first choice on a lower quality hunt/unit or the December archery hunts. Of course, even the draw data is somewhat hard to digest because those unsuccessful 2nd/3rd choice applicants could have been successful on their first choice.
 
Just curious if you're pulling these odds from GoHunt?

There are definitely some lower quality hunts that are easier to draw and a few that saw 100% of resident applicants draw as a first choice last year, but those generally involved burning your first choice on a lower quality hunt/unit or the December archery hunts. Of course, even the draw data is somewhat hard to digest because those unsuccessful 2nd/3rd choice applicants could have been successful on their first choice.
Yes goHunt. Yes, their odds are generally the most accurate thing out there.

Choice order does not matter except that you may draw a higher choice instead. Whatever hunt code on your application has the highest draw odds equals the odds that you draw one of your three choices. If a hunt is easy to draw, and you put it as your third choice the only reason you are less likely to draw it than if you placed it as your first choice is that you may draw your first or second choice instead. Put another way, if you place a hunt as your third choice, and you do not draw any hunts at all, you absolutely would not have drawn it if it had been your first choice instead of your third. Lots of people draw a hunt as their third choice that people who had it as their first choice did not draw. It’s about the randomly generated application order. NM looks at all three of your first three choices before moving on to the next application.

Choice order does matter in terms of WHICH of your choices you might draw, but it has absolutely nothing at all to do with IF you draw AT ALL.
 
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Yes goHunt. Yes, their odds are generally the most accurate thing out there.

Choice order does not matter except that you may draw a higher choice instead. Whatever hunt code on your application has the highest draw odds equals the odds that you draw one of your three choices. If a hunt is easy to draw, and you put it as your third choice the only reason you are less likely to draw it than if you placed it as your first choice is that you may draw your first or second choice instead. Put another way, if you place a hunt as your third choice, and you do not draw any hunts at all, you absolutely would not have drawn it if it had been your first choice instead of your third. Lots of people draw a hunt as their third choice that people who had it as their first choice did not draw. It’s about the randomly generated application order. NM looks at all three of your first three choices before moving on to the next application.

Choice order does matter in terms of WHICH of your choices you might draw, but it has absolutely nothing at all to do with IF you draw AT ALL.
Good points, I had a bit of a brain fart on the 2nd/3rd choices.
 
Applied in NM for the first time two years ago, and drew 1st choice buck tag at about 2-3% odds....last year struck out so I figure this year I'm DUE!!

Might even start e scouting my 1st choice archery elk unit now...;)

Good luck to all.
 
...and I've only drawn a 1st choice for elk or deer once in 26 yrs. Last year,mz deer and I had a screwed up foot and did not hunt. lol
 
...and I've only drawn a 1st choice for elk or deer once in 26 yrs. Last year,mz deer and I had a screwed up foot and did not hunt. lol
I’ve drawn a handful of first choices in less time BUT my first choices are usually pretty mid-tier.
 
I haven’t ever drawn a tag in New Mexico but this will be the year since I have a dall sheep hunt booked! But that’s fine I will always take a ibex, oryx, or bighorn sheep tag haha
 
I was on a hunt last year and a guy from US Outfitters told me Floyd Lee Ranch leased the entire state hunting rights and not to bother reapplying. Sucks, but at least there's OTC Colorado!
You believe stuff like that? There's a video on YouTube from some guys that ran into that problem last year and they called his bluff. Belive if was elkshape that did the video. Im not even from that part of NM and hear rumors about the US Outfitters and what they do on the Floyd Lee Ranch.
 
You believe stuff like that? There's a video on YouTube from some guys that ran into that problem last year and they called his bluff. Belive if was elkshape that did the video. Im not even from that part of NM and hear rumors about the US Outfitters and what they do on the Floyd Lee Ranch.
I think there was a dose of sarcasm
 
It’s hard to hunt NM without having a run in with a land owner unless you’re in one of the units that is mostly public. I’ve had them claim that public land was private, claim that you had to have permission from the lessee to hunt state trust land, claim that open gate land that they were actually being payed to allow public hunters on was not enrolled in open gate, claim that county roads were private, claim that you can’t park on the side of a country road without trespassing because the right of way does not extend to the shoulders, even though the land bordering the road was state trust land, and without fail, they say they’ll be calling THE SHERIFF. They never say they’re going to call the GW.
 
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