Ep. 23: Remi's First Nevada Bighorn Sheep Tag and How to Win Application Season
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As a guide and hunter, I've spent thousands of days in the field. This show is about translating my hard-won experiences into tips and tactics that'll get you closer to your ultimate goal, success in the field. I'm Remy Warren. This is Cutting the Distance. This podcast is presented by Yeti, built for the wild. Well, hello, friends. Welcome back. Hey, it's like the second week of the new year.

Just welcome to the new Roaring 20s. I feel like it's going to be a good year. And if you're anything like me, you're thinking, okay, this coming season, I've got a lot of stuff on my mind. But right now, what's on my mind is what I like to call application season.

It's that time of year where it's just, I'm going to start planning my hunts for 2020 now. Now you might be asking yourself, where do I apply? What should I be looking for? So whether you're a first time Western big game hunter, or maybe you're just looking for something new, I really think this podcast this week is just for you. Because what I'm going to be doing is I'm going to break down the application basics as well as some strategies to draw tags sooner.

I'm also going to touch on a few over-the-counter opportunities and where to start looking for your next big game Western hunt. If I think back to all the tags I've drawn, all the hunts I've been on, probably one of the most exciting, just opening the mail and finding out what I drew, was the first time that I drew a sheep tag.

Now I drew it in the state of Nevada, my home state for a desert bighorn sheep. I was about 15 years old and I can just remember one, how exciting it was to draw that and get to go on my very own sheep hunt, but also how that hunt played out was pretty cool as well. So I'm going to tell you the story of my first sheep tag in the state of Nevada.

If you know me, you know that sheep hunting is one of my favorite things to do. There's a lot of reasons behind that. One, just the challenge and the type of country that sheep take you. But the other part of it is that drawing a sheep tag is extremely difficult in most instances.

I went on my first sheep hunt. I didn't have a tag, but my dad drew a California bighorn sheep tag in the state of Nevada. So a California bighorn is just a subspecies of a Rocky Mountain bighorn. It doesn't mean a sheep in California. It's like a subspecies. So they're a little bit smaller than a Rocky Mountain bighorn, but a lot of people classify them as a Rocky Mountain bighorn. They're just, they have smaller horns. So we kind of separate that subspecies out.

So my dad drew this California bighorn tag in Nevada and I was, I think at the time, 11 years old. I had two younger brothers and my dad, his thing was he wanted to take us on the hunt and he wanted us to be there when he got a sheep. He ended up getting a ram and as soon as I walked up on that ram with him, I thought, this is the coolest thing ever. I want to hunt sheep one day. But I knew that it was extremely difficult to get a tag.

Now, fast forward, I could start applying for tags when I was 12 years old in Nevada. And a few years later, when I was 15 years old, is when I drew my first sheep tag. I'll never forget the moment that I checked to the mail and realized that I drew a tag. I was actually at my dad's shop helping, just working, doing some

prep work for painting. And the mail had come in and he had the tag sent to his office. And I was like, okay. I went in the office and opened up the letter that back then before you would check online, opened up the letter that said what we were successful for. And as I started reading, I saw it, desert bighorn sheep. I immediately started hyperventilating. I was just that excited. I literally couldn't breathe. I was just...

freaking out. I don't think I'd ever experienced something that exciting because I never in my wildest dreams thought that I would draw a sheep tag that soon. I thought about it every day. Pretty much every day of my life, I just dreamed about drawing a sheep tag. And to open that letter and realize that I was going to be hunting sheep was pretty exciting. My dad ran and thought maybe something was wrong. And then by the time I could start talking, I thought...

I drew a desert sheep tag. He started freaking out and I was like, no, you got to see what you drew. He opened his and he drew a desert sheep tag the same year, different unit, but we'd both drawn desert sheep tags in the same year. That was probably one of the most exciting moments I can ever think of. We literally just both started freaking out.

But now it was time to plan because neither of us had ever hunted desert bighorn sheep. This was something new to us. And so there's one, a big learning curve and two, just hunting a species that we'd never hunted, but also like a type of hunting that we weren't really that good at at that point, which was a lot of glassing and a lot of tough glassing in some really open country.

But we ended up picking up some tips from some friends that had sheep hunted before and actually ran into a guy that had been in the unit that I drew. So I drew a unit down in Southern Nevada, which was on the Nellis Air Force Base. So in order to hunt my area, I had to go to a special location.

indoctrination type class and then go to a special briefing on the base where they would give you a pass you and the person that you were hunting with there was no pre-scouting allowed you just once you got that then you're allowed to hunt that area throughout the season unless some portion of it got closed or whatever

Now, I drew the tag and there was only two tags available that year in the unit. When we applied for that tag, we just kind of looked at it, looked at some of the odds before, just figured, oh, we'll just put in for an area with very limited tags, at least there won't be a lot of hunters around. The trouble with my unit was the year before, there was a drought and a major die-off. It was traditionally a good area, but this year, things really plummeted.

My dad's sheep tag was an earlier season than mine and a lot further north, a lot closer to home. So he ended up getting a sheep before we ended up going on my hunt.

Now, the season was right around Christmas time. So we decided, okay, he's like pretty cool about it. He thought, all right, you've got a desert sheep tag. You can take off pretty much as much school as long as you keep your grades good and don't get held back. Which by the end of the year, I ended up missing the exact number of legal days before I would have had to retake that year. But it didn't matter because I was a desert sheep hunting guy.

So we drive down to Vegas, do the indoctrination and head out into the unit. The first couple of days were with a guy that had hunted the neighboring area and he actually had some mules and was just showing us some types of areas where we should start looking. We talked to the biologist there. We just got as much information as we could, but what it had amounted to and all of the research that we'd done was it was going to be very, very, very difficult to find any sheep.

Because if there was any left, they probably were just moving through because there was really hardly any water left. All the guzzlers were dry. The sheep had either moved on or died, unfortunately. So we started hunting, glassing, hiking, looking from area to area to area. The first day went by, we saw no sheep, but kept our hopes high.

You know, I kept thinking, hey, I've got a sheep tag. I wasn't looking for the biggest sheep on the mountain. I was just looking for any legal ram. That's all I wanted was a ram. Just the opportunity to harvest my own ram. The next day went by, no sheep. The third day, no sheep. After a week of hunting hard, we had seen a total of zero sheep.

Now, I think the first living animal we saw was probably on day seven or eight. There was a kit fox standing out in the desert. And we thought that was pretty exciting. We'd seen no other living animals up until that point. It was getting pretty close to Christmas now. And so we'd promised my mom that we were going to go back home for Christmas. But we'd had plans to then drive back Christmas night to keep hunting till the end of the season. So...

It was Christmas time, Christmas Eve. We loaded up, we drove home. It was about a six or seven, it was probably about a seven hour drive. Did Christmas with the family, loaded up that night, drove all night back to the unit on Christmas night. We get up, start hunting. There wasn't that many days left in the season. And just as the week prior, no sightings of animals.

I'm not sure exactly at this point, I can't remember exactly how many days we hunted. It was over two weeks and we hadn't seen a single sheep, but my dad was in it for the long haul with me. He knew how much it meant to me. And my thought was, if we aren't out here, we can't find anything. We won't be successful.

It came down to the last day of the hunt. And there was another hunter in the unit that had a tag. And we kind of decided to just camp together. And that way, if somebody had seen something, maybe we could make a play or both make a play. He was down there by himself. And we had a trailer down there that we were staying in. So we figured, well, we'll just kind of camp and hunt together. We just met him out there. Never met him before that point. So it was the last day of the season.

And we were glassing this one area and he was in an area further north and he had actually spotted some sheep. But he figured with the waiting period and how long it would take him to draw again and the type of sheep that were in there, there wasn't really a ram that he wanted to take. So he came and found me and said, hey, if you want to go hunt those sheep, they're yours. And I said, heck yeah, I want to go hunt those sheep.

So I went into there. Me and my dad went into that area, parked up with our optics, started glassing, and we picked out a band of sheep that had pretty much moved in from a neighboring unit, which did have water. And there was a legal ram in that group, just one. So my dad held back with the spotting scope and tripod and just watched them. And I made about a mile hike up and around to where the sheep had disappeared in this canyon.

I started to creep over. I had my first rifle, a .243, and I started creeping up over the top, just glassing. I had pretty bad optics at this point, but I would just creep up, start glassing, looking as the new country below me would start to appear. And then I saw a band of about 20 sheep, a bunch of ewes, and in the middle was a ram pushing them around across the canyon about 250 yards away.

I laid down, took my jacket off, padded it up and set it on the ground, put the rifle on it, lined up on the ram, shot the ram and he ran right underneath toward me and all the other sheep went over. So he disappeared and then I saw him falling down the mountain. His legs were pretty much up in the air and he was on his back.

So I thought, oh, sweet. I radioed my dad and told him that I got the sheep. It was down below me. And he was going to come with his pack frame up there and help me out. And we were going to pack it out. So I just decided to wait above the ram. He actually ended up dying about...

90 yards below me. So I started working my way down. It was just these cliffs all the way down there. And as I started working down to the sheep, I kicked up a rock and it rolled and hit the ram, which was on his back upside down. Somehow the ram hadn't expired yet. He rolled over and started to run. I threw the gun up at 50 yards, shot the ram one more time. He went down for good. And I walked up on my first bighorn sheep.

It was one of the coolest moments ever and it was definitely due to a few things but mostly the fact that we applied for these tags and I just happened to get lucky and draw one of, in my opinion, the best tags you can draw early in my hunting career. I walked down and I laid my hands on my first bighorn sheep.

Now, if I wasn't hooked on sheep hunting before, that moment really solidified in me that I want to sheep hunt as often as possible. And because of that, that moment of walking up to that sheep really got me thinking of applying in other states that had sheep with hopes of drawing a sheep tag somewhere else in the future. And up until that point, me and my dad never even considered hunting somewhere out of state. But

But after that hunt, we talked about how cool it was, even though it was one of the hardest hunts still looking back to this day. That was the hardest hunt I've ever been on. Every hunt after that seems easy. Going that long without even seeing a living animal was mentally taxing. It was physically exhausting, but I persevered. We were successful and it really got our minds turning on where else can we find opportunities to have amazing hunts like this? And because of that, we started looking out of state.

You might be a hunter from somewhere, say, eastern US, Australia, New Zealand, whatever. Somewhere where you're thinking, hey, I want to start hunting western big game. I'm looking for elk, antelope, mule deer. Maybe you think that after hearing that story, sheep hunting might be for you.

There's so many tags out West, but it can be daunting when you're starting because the question arises, what state do I apply for? What animals, what units? There's so much information, so many different hunts, so many different rules that

When you first sit down, it can just seem overwhelming. Even if you live out West and you apply in your home state, maybe a neighboring state thought of applying for, if you live in Nevada, thought of applying for sheep and deer in Colorado might just seem very foreign. Now there's a ton of information out there now that was not out when I started hunting, but I think that that's probably why more people are exploring the options of hunting some of these things.

in places far away from where they live because there's so much information now out there and accessible. But what I want to do is I kind of want to break that down and just help you create an application plan. So when you're looking at applying for other states, I think that it's really important to have a plan and know your goals on what you want. Otherwise, really, that whole process just seems overwhelming.

In order to start that plan, I like to say you first need to know what you want to hunt and what you might want to hunt in the future.

When I look at my, let's just call it like a tag draw portfolio. When I look at my own tag draw portfolio, I have in some states, 21 points for some animals, 15 for others. And I start to think, okay, a lot of those hunts, when I started applying, I was trying to plan those out way off into the future. And it seems daunting when you're starting, but

But to be honest, there's a lot of tags that I've drawn in between. And there's a lot of hunts that I've done that require very few years, one or no years to draw in more of over-the-counter general tag type situations. And those are the hunts that I go on pretty much year to year are the easier to get tags. Some almost 100%, 50%, whatever. But in the future, those are the tags that I'm planning on

down the road and right now I kind of ignore the fact that it's gonna take a very long time if you're just getting started but those are the ways that I like to start planning first your immediate what do you want to start hunting and then what do you want to hunt in the future I think that tag draw applications can be a long-term game but there's still so many things that can be easy to draw so if you're thinking to yourself hey I want to go on my first elk hunt

Well, what I suggest to you is you look at a hunt this year, do you want to go on like, let's just get you elk hunting. And then while you're doing that plan for maybe a better hunt or a more premier tag or a different kind of hunt off into the future. So one of the first questions you got to ask yourself is what are the reasons you're applying? So do you want to hunt a premier limited trophy unit, just the biggest and the best bulls and bucks around?

Or are you thinking of maybe more of an opportunity hunt? Also, you got to ask yourself, what's the amount of time I'm willing to wait for a tag? And then you got to factor in those options into your application choices, as well as to narrowing down a state to hunt.

Because there's some states that are preference points, some states are bonus points, some states are just completely random draw. So when we're talking about picking a state to apply in, we got to know how that state operates, what types of tags are available, and then where you should start. Now this might get kind of lengthy, so I'm going to break it down to the basics. Now if this is something you do this all the time,

keep with me because what I'm going to do is I'm going to give you a few tag draw strategies in order to try to draw some of these tags a little bit sooner than you might if you just go in blind. What I want to do first is break down the three basic points of every state because every state is so different. Then this might be one of those podcasts where you want to, if you're listening to it while you drive, maybe come back after work or at work, whatever.

and re-listen to a few of these things, like the things that you key in now, jot down some notes, and then do some state-by-state research. Because I'm going to just break it down. I'm going to start real wide and just give you the definitions and a few of the states to think about. Then I'm going to help you form an application strategy. And then maybe I'll just break down a few little state-by-state tips.

So let's just break it down from the basics first. The three different types of states. I'm going to break down into the points. So there's a preference point system, and then there's a bonus point system. And then some states have just a combination of the two. And then some states have no points. So I'm just going to define those real quick. So a bonus point is just extra chances you get

for years of applying. So states like Montana and Nevada use bonus points. And what that is, is that's just an extra name in the hat. However, the goal of it is to reward people for longer time applying, but everybody is in the draw. So everybody has a chance to draw that year. So in my home state of Nevada, for instance, they actually square your bonus points. So if you're applying for your first year, you go in with one point.

Now, if you go in with 10 points, they're squaring out. So it's 10 times 10. So you're in with 100 plus that year's application, which is 101 names in the hat. So the guy that is in there the first year has one name in the hat. The guy that's in there 10 years has 101 names in the hat. However, people that apply their first year can get lucky and draw. And guys that have been applying forever may not be lucky and may take them more years to draw, but it should just reward the people that have been applying longer.

Now, states that have preference points, like Colorado and Wyoming, the person with the most points gets awarded tags first. So a lot of times those states are a little bit easier to plan out because...

Say there's a unit with three points, you draw that tag. And when you work up to three points, then you can draw that tag. The problem with that system is there's a little bit of point creep in some units where there's a higher demand and each year the point number keeps going up. But for the most part, in a lot of those preference point areas,

you kind of know, okay, with this many points, I have a reasonable chance or will be guaranteed a tag by applying for that area. Now, a lot of states have a combination of preference points and bonus points like Utah, where a few tags are issued to top people with points in the preference system. And then the other ones are issued in a random bonus point draw.

And then there's states like Alaska, New Mexico, and Idaho that have no points. So everybody is on the same playing field. I've applied in New Mexico for, gosh, I can't even remember, probably 17, 18 years. And I have just as good a chance as the guy who just decides to apply this year.

So the states with no points, that's just everybody's in the same pool. Everybody's in a random draw. And then non-residents in all those states are given a certain percentage of the tags, but it's not guaranteed that they're given that percentage. So a lot of it might be 10% of the tags go to non-residents. So up to that many could draw in the random draw for that unit, and then they're shut out.

But the no point states just everybody level playing field, no differentiation, whether you've been applying 50 years or one year. O'Reilly Auto Parts are in the business of keeping your car on the road. I love O'Reilly. In fact, the other day, I'm not kidding you. The other day I went into an O'Reilly Auto Parts looking for a part. I needed a different thing that wasn't really in there, you know, only like tangentially related to what they carry.

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Go to fishingbooker.com today. That's fishingbooker.com. Now that we've kind of covered the different types of states and points,

Here's how I think about it. You can't apply everywhere. So you first need to decide, okay, what species do I want to hunt? What's really important to me? And then you kind of can look at where you're going to save money by applying for one state for multiple species or applying for different states of different types of point systems.

I personally just apply everywhere. But over the years, I've drawn very few extremely limited entry tags. However, I have drawn quite a few what I would consider more general area or not necessarily over-the-counter tags. Some states don't really issue over-the-counter tags, but just tags that pretty much maybe residents can get over-the-counter, but non-residents have to apply for.

And then in some other states, I'm building up a lot of points just waiting for that one special tag that I know is going to be a phenomenal hunt. So if you were just starting out,

My advice to you would be to pick, say, three states. Maybe one of those is your home state, or if you're from somewhere else, maybe you're just going to invest in three states. And if I was to invest in three states, I would pick one state that has no points. I would pick one state that is on preference points, and I would pick one state that is on bonus points. The reason for that is the no point state allows you a more luck-based system that you could draw any year.

And within that, there might be some units that maybe are easier to draw than other places. I would also start looking at a preference point state because what that allows you to do is plan that two to five years out. You can go to the state websites, pick a unit that has relatively lower preference point options. So say maybe there's a unit that takes three points, five points, and go, okay, let's

In four or five years, I can hunt this unit, which might be a little better than a general unit. I got to wait a little bit longer, but up until that point, I'm applying for these other places. Then I would apply for that bonus point state as a state that could be long-term in the future, but also you might randomly draw it one of these years and have the hunt of a lifetime.

So that's how I would start narrowing it down to that way. So what I'm going to do is I'll go through a list of the states, give you preference bonus, how that state works. And then you just kind of decide from there which state you want to pick in that category. And then I'll kind of divulge ways that you can start planning and figure out where to apply once you've picked those states.

What I'm going to do is I'm just going to go through each state kind of in alphabetical order, the western state, and just give you a brief overview, maybe some little pointers on that state, and then we'll go into the research portion of it. So Alaska, there are no points. Everybody's kind of on the same playing field. Now, certain species, doll sheep, brown bear, mountain goat, you have to go with a guide, and you can't even apply for that without a guide, right?

But you can apply for bison, muskox, Roosevelt elk, black bear, caribou, moose, whatever.

without a guide. Now, Alaska's kind of its own thing because there's a lot of over-the-counter tags. You generally don't need to apply for a tag in Alaska to have a good hunt. And it may not even mean that you have a better hunt with a draw. Whereas most other states, if you have a draw tag that's limited entry, the quality's often better. The success rates are often better. So Alaska's kind of the oddball in that where it's not necessarily the case because getting to most of the areas in Alaska...

require some form of logistics and planning that happens whether you draw the tag or not. But most of the dryers are just around places that are a little bit logistically easier, but not necessarily cheaper. So that's just my overview of Alaska. So then we go to Arizona. Arizona has desert sheep, rocky mountain sheep, bison, elk, mule deer, coos deer, antelope,

It is a, for all intents and purposes, we'll call Arizona a bonus point state because unless you have max points, which is a very, very small percentage, I can't even remember how many they're up to now, but there's, you'll never obtain a tag in the max point pool for the top end units because there are so many people with so many tags now. So what they've done is they've switched their preference point system where a few tags are issued in max bonus points.

And then a few other tags are just issued in more of a bonus point random draw. So if you're new to applying to Arizona or don't have max points or aren't in the top view section of that max points, you're just going to look at Arizona as a random bonus point state.

California, it works mostly on, it's a modified preference point. So what it is, is a certain portion go to max points and a certain portion go to a random draw. It's a good one to plan out deer hunts because there are some pretty good deer hunts there where you can say, okay, I'm going to draw that in four years, five years, whatever. As far as elk and sheep go,

The sheep, pretty low odds of drawing elk, antelope, those. There's only one tag given to non-resident, so it's really not even worth applying for as a non-resident unless you're already just going to apply for the deer or the sheep or something like that. But it is a good state as far as preference goes. If you just want to guarantee, hey, I'm going to have a deer tag in this many years, you can do that. Plus, you have the chance of possibly drawing it sooner by it being modified preference point.

So Colorado, Colorado has desert sheep, rocky sheep, moose, mountain goats. They've got elk, deer, antelope. I think they have still have some of the highest populations of elk in

It's a great state to put in your plan for a few reasons. One, it probably has some of the best mule deer hunting in the country. Two, it has a lot of elk tags. Now, a lot of people do apply. It's closer to a lot of the states that are further east, but there's a lot of opportunity there. And there's some good animals as well. The cool thing about it is it is still a preference point state. So the people with the most points are awarded tags.

Let's say you go into a unit and you have three points. Everybody with three points gets a tag before anybody with two points gets a tag. And if everybody with three points gets a tag, then they start drawing within the two point category and so on. So you can go on their website. You can figure out, okay, some areas, how many points are pretty much needed. You can build up to that point level and then you can apply and you know, you're going to get a tag.

Now the moose, sheep, goat in that state is kind of a weighted bonus point preference point system. So you actually have to apply for three years there for the moose, sheep, goat without having any chance of drawing. And then once you get that, then it's more of a bonus point draw. So once you have three preference, then you can go in and it's more of a bonus point draw after you've built up three years of just applying with no option of drawing. Kind of different, but...

And then Idaho, no point draw there. It's just completely random. So the thing about Idaho is you can apply for elk, deer, antelope. So you can apply for all three of those if you want to do a limited controlled hunt. Or you can choose one of the three, sheep, moose, goat. If you apply for a sheep tag, a moose tag, or a goat tag, you cannot apply for anything else.

The reason they do that is to just increase the odds of people who choose to try to apply for those. But remember, there's no point. So I think that those are probably some of the better states for sheep, moose, and goat because you're in the same pool as everybody who's been doing it for a while. And you're limiting, you're weeding out some of the people that might be applying for deer or elk or antelope or one of the other species. So that's something to keep in mind.

Montana, that's where I do a lot of my guiding. There's options for non-residents for sheep, moose, goat, elk, deer, antelope. Now, Montana is a bonus point state, and then those points are squared each year. So if you, like I said earlier in the example, if you have 10 points, it's squared 10 times 10 plus that year's application. So the longer you apply, the higher your chances of drawing. However, the cool thing is,

You do not have to have max points to draw. You could draw it your first year. You could draw it your 10th year. You always have a chance. It's just your chance gets greater the longer you go.

So Nevada is a great state as well. It has a bonus point system. It's also squared like Montana. So same deal. You can apply, you could get it your first year. You're more likely to get it later. There's great deer hunting, elk hunting, really good trophy units. And it's a great state to apply for, for the top end type hunts. Um, there are some good hunts that are easier to draw, but I'd say most of the hunts in Nevada are fairly hard to draw. But if you do draw a

You're going to have a really good experience because there's fewer hunters and higher quality of animals in a lot of areas. But then the trouble is getting the tag. New Mexico. New Mexico has no points similar to Idaho. The odds are a lot better if you apply with an outfitter in New Mexico. I've drawn in all the years I've applied New Mexico one tag. I drew a deer tag, an archery late season deer tag, but in one of their better archery or deer units.

Now, it is random draw and you do have to front a lot of the license fees up front. But what that does is that kind of cuts down on your competition and the amount of people applying. So that's something to consider too. If you have a credit card, you don't mind putting some of those fees on. It's a great state to apply for because it causes a little bit of barrier to entry in order to increase odds for the people that do apply because there is no point system there.

Oregon is another state that's preference for deer, elk and antelope. A lot of the top end units, extremely hard to draw. You might not ever be able to catch that top preference point level if you're just starting out.

But you can also look for other species and other tags in that state that may not be a max point type hunt. There's black tails, there's Roosevelt elk. There's a lot of opportunity for people kind of looking for those hunts. There's also some over the counter opportunities there. And then sheep and goat, there are no points for that. So if you're just starting out, another great place to think about because there are no points.

Utah, max bonus point state. They also have a general deer season, which is just purely preference. So what they have is they've got a mix of a little bit of everything except for the random draw. So they have bonus points where the max, the person with the most points gets a tag. And then after that, they do the random bonus point draw. And then they have the general deer tag, which is just pure preference point. One with the most tags or the most points gets a tag in the general deer tag drawing.

Washington, another bonus point state, also squared, just to give you an exponential gain over the guy one year behind you. And then Wyoming is just a pure preference point state. So another great one if you want to plan a few years out or into the future, you can look at how many points it's going to take, and you've got that preference point right there. Now their goat and bison has no points, but for everything else, it's all preference.

Out of that list of states, what I think you should do is just pick a couple and focus on those states. Narrow it down and then start doing a little bit of research state by state. So almost every state online has some form of in-depth statistics on their fishing game websites. They have draw results, draw odds, harvest success rates. That's where I start. If I know nothing about the state or the area and I'm looking for an area that's purely big elk and

just a good hunt. I'm going to go to the elk section. I'm going to pull up draw odds, and I'm going to probably look for the area with the hardest to draw odds and then confirm how that hunt is based on the success rate. So if it's got really high success rate, really hard to draw, it's probably a really good unit. And it's probably going to take you a long time to draw.

Now, there's also a ton of other resources available out there online. There's a lot of application services and just magazines you can join. Epic Outdoors and some other ones, just Western Hunter Magazine has some great just information in there, state by state information, maybe not unit specific like some of the other publications, but there's a ton of information on exact units. I like to do my own research on the states and that's kind of what I want to touch on a little bit here.

It's just picking those states and then start diving into ways to narrow down your search there. Also looking at state record books. Those can give you ideas on counties to focus on for bigger animals. If you aren't so interested in the bigger animals, you just want that opportunity. I just want a good opportunity to go hunt. Then what I start to look for is areas with good draw odds and higher success rates.

higher than average success rates. So if you start thinking, okay, an elk hunt, you look over the state averages and maybe they're hovering around 15 to 20%, but you find an area that takes, ah, it's pretty good chance of drawing and it's got 30, 40, 50% success rate.

Higher than average, okay, that could be an indicator of this is a good area with a lot of animals. Once you've narrowed those areas down, then you can always kind of start researching that area. Talk to people on the ground, talk to other hunters on websites and forums, talk to fish and game officers, biologists, and just kind of build out an idea of what this hunt will look like.

One thing that I will stress is I have a lot of points in a lot of places, but I've drawn very few what I would consider extremely premium limited entry tags. So the best of the best. There's some where I have enough points to do it. I just haven't had the time to do it. But a lot of them, I just haven't had the luck and drawn those really good tags.

So what I do is I would say most of my hunts are literally on general units or what I would consider as close to over-the-counter tags as possible. Maybe it's everybody that applies gets it, but you've got to apply before this certain date. So when you're thinking about your tag strategy and you think, okay, I want to go hunt, let's say we're just going to pick up a random state. We're going to hunt. You want to hunt, right?

Idaho or Montana, let's say. And you know, okay, I want to hunt there. But what I would do is I would find a state where there are general type tags are easier to draw tags as a backup. So you can apply for, say, the same state, Montana, you can apply for

tag there and try to draw a harder to get unit. And if you don't get it, you default to a general area tag. There's a lot of states that have it because if you're already fronting the money for the application fee and the license and tags, then you might as well already start to plan a hunt in that state as well.

Now, when you apply for the permits, you're going to get a lot of that money back, but there is a portion of that that the state retains, and a lot of that goes to your license fee. So each state's different. When you start picking a state, look into the license fee and then look into some over-the-counter options there in case you don't draw anything.

For me, California is always one that I use as an over-the-counter tag if I don't draw anything else. There's other states like that. Idaho is another good one for that. Montana with their general tags.

There's some Wyoming leftover tags. Arizona has some great leftover tags. So when you pick a state, think about and research some of the over-the-counter or general area tags, as well as their limited entry tags. Because if you're already applying, maybe that's a way to save that license fee and use that that year and maybe have a hunt right now while you're waiting for those other hens to transpire. Because I think most people that contact me, they say, Hey, look,

I just want to go on my first elk hunt. There's all this application information out there. Where do I even start? So you start by making a plan, figuring out what you want to hunt. When you apply for that state, pick say three states. If you can afford that, if not, just pick one state and start working your way up, working your way up the ladder to a preference point hunt, but see if there's a, you can find the sweet spot where there's a state that you can get a general or an easy to draw tag where you can just go.

So as promised, I want to give you guys some tricks that I've used in the past to just get drawn sooner. And I think the trick to getting drawn is a combination of persistence and then balancing opportunity and trophy quality. So what that might mean is adjusting certain things like season dates, unit choices, and weapon choice, right?

So I've got four tricks here that I use constantly. The first one, always gain a point. If you have the option, there's some states where you can apply for a hunt and you don't accumulate a point because you don't want to spend the extra 20 bucks. It's not worth doing. If you can get a point, get a point in as many places as you can.

Honestly, if you think about it in your application strategy, you're much better picking one place and just hitting it till you quit it. Just getting the points there, building the points, then going blanket broadcast effect, choosing a bunch of states and not building anything anywhere. Just trying to hope that random luck.

You're just a lot better picking one place and sticking to it. If you only got a limited amount of resources, I would suggest consistently doing the same place over and over building points so you can at least build for something in the future. And within that, if you're picking a state, find a state where if you have to put up front fees and you decide you want to do a more general area hunt, they have some options to actually hunt, not just apply. Trick number two,

go a little more primitive. Now, some of the better units, say rifle tags can be hard to draw, but you might look in some of those areas and muzzleloader hunts might be available. Archery hunts might be available. There's a lot of states like Arizona where to draw a rifle tag is nearly impossible, yet you can get an archery tag over the counter and go hunt that same unit. So it's a good idea to look at.

What are some good areas? And then if I switch up my weapon choices, will I be able to get a tag there a lot easier? Trick number three, change the dates of the hunts. The premier hunts, the hardest to draw hunts, if you start looking through state regulations, are going to be those rut hunts. Elk rut, mule deer rut. So the September hunts for elk, especially if they're rifle, and the November hunts for mule deer. But a lot of those states have tags in those areas outside of the rut.

that are easier to draw and may even be considered in a general unit. So that's something to think about is, okay, find an area when you're doing your state research, look at it, what's an area that's hard to draw a high success rate, and then look at other seasons where tags are available there. You may find that a second season or a later season in there is easy to get a tag. Now, it might not be as much success, but if you have a tag in your pocket, you're going to have a lot more success than if you don't.

And so that's a trick that I use a lot, changing it to more of an off period time where you just got to hunt a little bit harder. But as long as you have a tag in a good area, you're hunting the best area, just not the best season. And that's a really good trick to think about.

And then the fourth trick is joining forces with other hunters that might have more points than you. If you're building up points in one state, now not every state you can do this, but certain states when you apply as a party, what they do is they split the number of points and then they average them. You go in as one application.

Well, if you got a buddy, you say, hey, find a state where you can build points and he can build points. And then you guys apply as a party later on down the road where you can split the points for each state's application. It's a great way to do it a little bit cheaper. Now, you might accidentally draw your Nevada tag while building up some points on the way. Good for you. That's awesome. But, you know, five years down the road, you can say, hey, let's apply as a party. You split the points and you both go in with three points if you had five points.

So that's just a good way to think about maybe getting into a tag a little bit sooner, finding some people or friends that have points other places, you build points somewhere else. And maybe later on down the road, you decide, hey, let's apply for a party this year. You know, we might have a good chance to draw and you'll have somebody to hunt with as well. So that's just another thought. If you don't have points, maybe you can find somebody that you know that has points somewhere else.

ask to start applying with them because look, it's going to save them money and they're going to have somebody to hunt with. When you go to split the hunt costs and the travel costs to get there, it's always fun to hunt with a friend or a buddy. So talk to people that you know, maybe they've been building points somewhere else and it might be beneficial for you guys to team up and apply as a party. Now I should talk about, because some people think, oh, if you apply as a party, you go in, you get more chances in there. That's not true. You go in as one application. And if that one application is drawn, then you both get tags.

So it's the same odds, but the guy with lower points can sometimes get higher points. You could help your friends out or your friends could help you out. While it might seem like a lot to digest over a podcast, really just start thinking about the states, write down a couple, and then start doing your research on it. That's where you start. And then you narrow it down onto a unit and you narrow that unit into an area. So you start big and then you start focusing in.

That's the way that I plan my hunts every year. I've done it for years and when I started out it was difficult because there wasn't so much information out there. If you're just new to it, subscribe to something where they give you a little bit more information about it. But honestly you don't have to because you can get all the information that all these services use is free information. It's out there on the state websites. You can do your own research.

The Fish and Game State websites are incredible resources. I go through every state's website every year, looking at data points that they put out there, researching units, looking at draw odds, looking at harvest success rates. And then I plan my hunts based a lot around that and then talking to people on the ground. What you got to do is you just got to pick those places and start applying because the application season's now.

And the hunt that you have this fall may be dependent on what you did and the research you did right now this time of year. A lot of the deadlines are going to start coming up and they're going to come up fast. So make sure that you pick your state, you figure out when the deadlines are, what you need to apply, how much it's going to cost, and then start narrowing it down, doing some research and finding your area for your hunt this season.

There was a lot to digest there. A lot of things to think about, a few things to write down, and a lot of good homework before the season comes. But I could probably have broken that down into five podcasts and gone months and months. But by that point, the application season would be over. So I just want to give you my best tips, the best things state by state.

and go from there. Feel free to reach out with some of your ideas on your applications. I cannot get to everyone. If it's a quick answer for me, odds are I will probably shoot you a message back. I try to get to as many as I can. But yeah, thank you guys so much for listening in.

I can't wait to see how your success pans out. And I also love hearing from guys that are just like, this is my first elk hunt. I'm going on my first trip. Here's what I'm thinking. You know, I can tell you if you're on the right path. And I think that if you, once you start diving into the research and doing some of this stuff, just go with it, man. Don't be afraid you're doing something wrong. There are no wrong answers.

Nobody has a secret formula, but you'll pick up a few things once you start doing it a couple times. I know it can be daunting at first, but you really just have to pick something and dive in. That's the first step. Just pick something, focus in, do some research, and then run with it.

So until next week, I hope that you guys get some applications out there. Just start thinking about how, what do I want to do? This is the year. If you've been thinking about it, now is the time. Just do it. It's not getting any cheaper. It's not getting any easier. It's not getting any better. We're in the golden age of it right now. So get your apps in there. Start planning your elk hunt, your deer hunt, your sheep hunt, and get it going. May the odds be ever in your favor.

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