Last year, North Dakota hunters
submitted a record number of applications for moose, elk and bighorn sheep
licenses.
This
was a bit of a curiosity because it was the first time Game and Fish had made
the application process all-electronic for moose, elk and sheep, meaning paper
applications were not used. There was some anticipation that license
applications might go down a bit because of that, but apparently these
once-in-a-lifetime licenses are more popular than ever.
Which, of course, generally reduces the
odds of drawing one in the lottery, but this year that might be offset by
significantly more licenses available for elk and moose than last year.
Here’s some more details for this year:
• A total of 478 elk licenses are
available to hunters this fall, an increase of 70 from last year and the most
since 2011.
• A record 479 moose licenses are
available in 2018, an increase of 145 from last year. Most of the increase is
antlerless licenses in northwestern North Dakota because of an increasing moose
population in that area.
• A bighorn sheep hunting season is
tentatively scheduled to open in 2019. The status of the bighorn sheep season
will be determined Sept. 1, after summer population surveys are completed.
• Bighorn sheep applicants must apply
for a license at the same time as moose and elk. Once total licenses are
determined for each unit in late summer, the bighorn lottery will then be held,
and successful applicants will be contacted to select a hunting unit.
Year in and year out, I field many calls
and emails from prospective hunters about how they might improve their odds,
such as applying for a cow license vs. a bull or “any” license in a
particular unit.
That’s a good question, as last year for
both “any elk” and “any moose” licenses, which allow harvest of either a bull
or cow/calf, odds were less than one in a hundred. For cow or antlerless elk,
however, the overall success rate was about 41 percent, and for cow moose, just
about 21 percent.
The breakdown of number of applicants,
licenses available and odds of drawing a license for each elk and moose unit
and license type is available on the Game and Fish website at
gf.nd.gov
.
Regardless of the odds, I try to make
sure that interested hunters are aware of the time and resources that usually
are necessary to have a successful hunt.
Many hunters tend to equate these
special big game hunts with deer hunting, because that’s what they know. With
the exception of some landowners who live within certain moose and elk units,
these licenses are once-in-a-lifetime. We don’t get to go the first time, learn
on the go, then come back much better prepared the next time we get the same
license.
My point in all of this is to help
potential applicants understand they need to be willing to prepare for a long
and difficult hunt.
The deadline for applying is March 27.