New Mexico Unit 50 Elk

[DRMWHill2]

My father in law, a friend and myself were forturnate enough to be drawn for a unit 50 Bull Elk hunt. The hunt is Oct. 8-12 and is a rifle hunt. I live in Texas (by Houston) but love hunting in New Mexico. Being so far away, I have to do most of my scouting utilizing google earth as well as maps. I realize this unit is mainly a migrational unit but am hopeing that there are some resident Elk. I am a fire fighter and my friend is an officer so we usually go to the local FD and PD hoping to find some hunters willing to give a little info. If any of you are familar with this unit and willing to pass along some info we would appreciate it greatly. This will be our first time hunting elk and we have always been do it yourself type hunters. We are not afraid to walk to avoid crowds

 

[justin7-11]

I have hunted unit 50 many times. If you do not mind walking, hunt the south end of the unit between Ojo Caliente and El Rito. PotMountain and the northern areas have been over ran with ATV hunters. You are lucky to find somebody that has even seen an elk in the north part of the unit while hunting. I hunted Pot mountain the first day last year and saw 40+ hunters and no elk. It will be covered in elk by November but that really doesn't do you any good. The West Side of 285 south of Ojo Caliente has about 60,000 acres of Public Ground. It is private right against the highway so be careful how you access it. This is open country but it has lots of elk. Be prepared to shoot longer ranges. You will find elk there if you do lots of walking and glassing. We hardly ever see other hunters down there. 95% of the hunters will be hunting on PotMountain with only 5% of the elk population there.