Colorado Elk Mule Deer Bear

Unit 40 (Glade Park)

Colorado Hunting Guide — Elk, Mule Deer, Bear

Unit 40 (Glade Park) sits on Colorado's western edge in Mesa County, framed by the Colorado River on the north, US 50 on the east, CO 141 and the Dolores River on the south, and Utah on the west. It's high-desert mesa and canyon country, from 4,702 to 9,061 feet. CPW publishes no per-unit elk breakdown. CPW also warns that most land here is private, and that decides whether this tag is worth your trip.

View Draw Odds Colorado Hunting Guide

🏔️

62%

Public Land

⛰️

4,702–9,061 ft

Sampled elevation

Build your own PDF hunt guide for Unit 40

Answer a few questions about your tag, your season and your rig, and the Field Intelligence Report builds a print-ready Colorado Unit 40 guide around your hunt: three ranked spots with morning, afternoon and evening plays, a day-by-day plan, topo maps with every pin numbered, a camp and access plan, the legal and retrieval rules for this unit, shot discipline, a meat-care and pack-out plan, and a pre-trip checklist. Every coordinate sits on land recorded as public.

Elk guide Mule Deer guide Bear guide

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Elk Hunting in Unit 40

Where to Find Elk in Unit 40: Private-Land Reality and the Mesa Country

Start with the warning, because CPW leads with it. The agency marks Unit 40 as one where landowner permission is advisable before you apply, and says most land is private. Our ownership read agrees it's heavily private. The terrain features below are mapped as public, but we can't verify parcel lines for you. Confirm every one on a current ownership map before you commit a day to it.

CPW's guide doesn't say where elk concentrate in this unit, and nobody has counted them for us. It gives the unit's edges: the Colorado River north, US 50 east, CO 141 and the Dolores River south, Utah west. Those are framing lines, not elk lines. What follows is our read of the terrain, not a harvest map.

Snyder Flats and Oak Hill: the high ground

The unit tops out at 9,061 feet, and the best elk country on a map like this is up high. Snyder Flats sits at 8,373 feet and is the highest holding ground we can name. Oak Hill (8,376) and Renegade Point (8,337) are within a few feet of it in elevation. That makes them natural glassing platforms over the benches below. If you want cooler, timbered or oakbrush country, begin here.

Lost Horse Basin, Ryan Park and Nancy Hanks Gulch

Step down and the country opens into basins and flats. Lost Horse Basin is at 7,366 feet, Ryan Park at 6,688 and Nancy Hanks Gulch at 6,364. These mid-elevation pockets are where we'd spend the middle of a hunt. Black Ridge (7,137) and Clarks Bench (7,110) give you elevated vantage points at about the same level. Look for feed and water together, then work the edges between them.

The canyon tier: Ladder, Sieber, Toms, Kings and Cross

Ladder Canyon (6,143) leads a string of deep drainages that drop through Sieber (5,748), Toms (5,736), Kings (5,610) and Cross Canyon (5,439). They're steep and dry. If weather pushes elk off the mesas, expect them to use this ground. Treat it as a fallback, or a late-season option, rather than a first-day plan.

We'd skip the lowest country: East Fork Pollock Canyon (4,701), West Bangs Canyon and the river-bottom benches near Horse Point and Black Rocks. That's hot, thin desert, and it sits next to the most development.

Water and roads

Mapped water is plentiful on paper: 696 tanks, 29 springs, 27 lakes and a lot of drainage lines. Many of the tanks are probably stock tanks, and many of the streams are dry washes. Named springs worth locating on your map are Monument, End, Corduroy, Thrailkill, Notch and Big. On the road side, CO 141 (paved) runs along the south edge, and US 50 and CO 340 are the paved entries. Road 4.2, BLM 803, BLM 614 and Wright Draw are graded gravel and fine for 2WD.

Unit 40 terrain and land status

Measured from the unit boundary, not from the agency write-up

The lay of it

4,702–9,061 ft on a terrain sample , averaging 6,871 ft ; peaks can run higher. That spread means you can hunt two seasons in one day — plan clothing for both ends.
742 sq mi inside the boundary.

Who owns the ground

Private / Other — 100%

Roughly 0% is public. Carry a land-status layer anyway — these are area percentages, not a map of where the boundaries fall.

Water on the ground

696 tanks
29 springs
2,084 stream segments
27 lakes

Counts from mapping data, so this is how many exist, not how many hold water in a dry year. Sitting water only pays where you find fresh tracks.

Named features inside the unit

Glass from: Piñon Mesa (9,688 ft), Oak Hill (8,376 ft), Renegade Point (8,337 ft), Black Ridge (7,137 ft)

Holding ground: Snyder Flats (8,373 ft), Lost Horse Basin (7,366 ft), Ryan Park (6,688 ft), Horsethief Canyon SWA, Leatha Jean Stassen SWA

Every one of these was tested against the unit polygon before it went on the map. They are starting points, not agency recommendations.

How to Hunt Elk in Unit 40: Glass the Mesas, Lock Down Access

Fix access before anything else. With most of the unit private, a hunt here begins with phone calls to landowners and an ownership map, not boots on a trail. Do it before the season, not at the trailhead. Get permission in writing if you can. Know exactly where public ground starts and stops, because the boundary lines don't follow the roads.

Glass from the points, hunt the transitions

This country rewards patience on optics. Oak Hill, Renegade Point and Black Ridge are all mapped as glassing spots, and Clarks Bench gives you a lower platform. Be on one before first light. Elk feed in the open at dawn and dusk, then slip into oakbrush and pinyon-juniper pockets as the sun climbs. Glass the edges where the benches break into the draws: Lost Horse Basin, Ryan Park, Nancy Hanks Gulch. Mark where animals go in, then plan your approach for the next morning.

Wind and thermals in canyon country

Mornings, cold air drains downhill. By midday it flows back up the slopes. Stalking into a canyon like Ladder or Sieber means the wind swirls constantly. Plan to come from above where you can, and keep the wind in your face on side-hills. If you can't pin the wind, back out and try another angle. Don't push through it.

Water as a fixed point

We can't tell you which tanks or springs hold elk, because nobody has published that. Use the named springs — Monument, End, Corduroy, Thrailkill, Notch, Big — as scouting targets. Look for fresh sign before you set up on any of them. A dry spring in a dry year is just a rock.

A realistic day

Drive in the night before on CO 141 or the graded gravel roads (road 4.2, BLM 803, BLM 614). Camp or stay in Fruita, Loma or Grand Junction, since the unit has no mapped campgrounds. Glass from first light to about 9 a.m. Then still-hunt or stalk the draws you've been watching. Come midday, sit on a bench with a view of a feeding area. Evening, back on the point. If you aren't seeing elk by the second day, move up toward Snyder Flats rather than down into the canyons.

Check CPW's current brochure for your season dates, weapon rules and any retrieval or access restrictions. We won't guess at them here.

Getting in and staying out: unit 40

Named routes and what they need

CO 141 — 18 mi · Paved (all rigs)
4.2 — 7.7 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
CO 141;BLM P2014 — 6.3 mi · Paved (all rigs)
BLM 803 — 1.9 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
BLM 614 — 1.6 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
Wright Draw — 1.5 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)

Ratings come from road data, not from a drive this season. Check current conditions with the managing office before you commit a trailer.

Nearest services

Fruita — 14.9 mi · groceries, gear
Orchard Mesa — 15.2 mi · groceries, gear
Grand Junction — 15.4 mi · groceries, gear
Loma — 16.9 mi · no services listed
Fruitvale — 19 mi · groceries, gear

Developed camps

Unnamed camp site
Unnamed camp site
Bull Draw
Rattlesnake
Banjo

Season weather and signal

Jan39° / 16° · 0.9" precip
Aug89° / 58° · 1" precip
Sep80° / 49° · 1.3" precip
Oct66° / 37° · 1.4" precip
Nov51° / 27° · 0.9" precip
Dec39° / 17° · 0.9" precip

Best signal is Verizon at about 21% of the unit. Plan on being out of contact and tell someone your route.

Colorado rules that decide your day

Summarised from CPW regulations. They change — read the current regulations and your permit-tag before you hunt.

Legal shooting hours

Big game may be taken from half an hour before sunrise to half an hour after sunset.

Motorized retrieval

Colorado has no general off-road retrieval allowance. Travel stays on designated routes, so plan to pack every animal out on your back or with stock. Check the forest or BLM travel map for the roads that are actually open in hunting season.

Tagging

Validate and attach your carcass tag before the animal is moved, and keep evidence of sex attached until the carcass reaches your home or a processor.

Leaving meat

Abandoning edible meat is illegal. CPW counts the four quarters and the loins.

Where you may not shoot

Occupied structures — No discharging a firearm within 50 yards of a developed campsite, and never toward an occupied building.
Roads — No shooting from or across a public road, and no shooting from a motor vehicle.

Elk: where to put the shot

Broadside or quartering away, on the back edge of the front leg about a third of the way up the body. That is lungs, and on a quartering-away angle it picks up the far shoulder.

Shots to refuse

No straight-on and no straight-away shots. An elk's chest is deep and the margin is small.
Nothing standing behind or overlapping the animal you picked. A pass-through kills the elk behind it too.
Your maximum range is the farthest you have put three shots in a paper plate off the sticks you are actually carrying. Not the farthest you have ever hit anything.
Scope on 3–4x. A herd fills a 12x field of view and you lose the animal you picked.

Identification:On an antlerless tag, legal means no antler of any kind through the skin. A spike looks exactly like a cow until it turns its head. If you can't see the head, don't shoot.

Plan the carry: roughly 150– 220 lb of boned-out meat, before head and hide — two to four large coolers, plus bagged ice from town. ProHunt planning estimate, not an agency figure.

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Elk Success Rates

All manners of take60%

Archery74%

Muzzleloader60%

Rifle58%

CPW's 2023 harvest estimates put elk success in unit 40 at 60% — 305 animals taken by 507 hunters. The hunter count is large enough for the percentage to mean something and small enough that a good or bad year still moves it.

Archery — 74% success, 48 taken by 65 hunters
Muzzleloader — 60% success, 25 taken by 42 hunters
Rifle — 58% success, 232 taken by 400 hunters

These are the agency's own printed figures for this unit, not a modelled estimate and not a state average. They describe one season, so check CPW's current harvest estimates before you read a trend into them.

Elk Draw Odds

Season	Tags	Applicants	Draw %	Pts Req
Archery — 1st Season either sex (resident)	43	329	13.1%	10
Archery — 1st Season either sex (nonresident)	10	160	6.3%	24
Muzzleloader — 1st Season either sex (resident)	24	150	16.0%	11
Muzzleloader — 1st Season either sex (nonresident)	5	62	8.1%	28
Muzzleloader — 1st Season cow only (resident)	6	51	11.8%	1
Muzzleloader — 1st Season cow only (nonresident)	0	3	0.0%	—
Rifle — 1st Season either sex (resident)	19	438	4.3%	14
Rifle — 1st Season either sex (nonresident)	4	153	2.6%	29
Rifle — 2nd Season either sex (resident)	16	290	5.5%	12
Rifle — 2nd Season either sex (nonresident)	4	115	3.5%	27
Rifle — 3rd Season either sex (resident)	17	240	7.1%	12
Rifle — 3rd Season either sex (nonresident)	4	110	3.6%	26
Rifle — 4th Season either sex (resident)	13	126	10.3%	10
Rifle — 4th Season either sex (nonresident)	3	84	3.6%	25
Rifle — 1st Season either sex (resident)	3	118	2.5%	28
Rifle — 1st Season either sex (nonresident)	0	0	0.0%	—
Rifle — 1st Season cow only (resident)	21	141	14.9%	1
Rifle — 1st Season cow only (nonresident)	1	12	8.3%	1
Rifle — 2nd Season cow only (resident)	22	199	11.1%	1
Rifle — 2nd Season cow only (nonresident)	1	18	5.6%	1
Rifle — 3rd Season cow only (resident)	20	137	14.6%	—
Rifle — 3rd Season cow only (nonresident)	3	19	15.8%	—
Rifle — 4th Season cow only (resident)	55	233	23.6%	—
Rifle — 4th Season cow only (nonresident)	8	22	36.4%	—
Rifle — 5th Season cow only (resident)	127	215	59.1%	—
Rifle — 5th Season cow only (nonresident)	17	22	77.3%	—
Rifle — 1st Season cow only (resident)	18	107	16.8%	3
Rifle — 1st Season cow only (nonresident)	0	0	0.0%	—
Rifle — 2nd Season cow only (resident)	18	91	19.8%	2
Rifle — 2nd Season cow only (nonresident)	0	0	0.0%	—
Rifle — 1st Season cow only (resident)	39	216	18.1%	—
Rifle — 1st Season cow only (nonresident)	2	8	25.0%	—

Data from 2026 draw results. Each row is one residency pool — read the label before the number.

Open in Draw Odds Engine

CPW's 2026 draw recap for elk in unit 40, by hunt code, with resident and nonresident kept apart because the two draw from different licence pools:

EE040O1R — Rifle, 1st Season, Either Sex, resident: 438 applicants for 19 licences, 4.3% drawn, 14 preference points needed
EE040O1A — Archery, 1st Season, Either Sex, resident: 329 applicants for 43 licences, 13.1% drawn, 10 preference points needed
EE040O2R — Rifle, 2nd Season, Either Sex, resident: 290 applicants for 16 licences, 5.5% drawn, 12 preference points needed
EE040O3R — Rifle, 3rd Season, Either Sex, resident: 240 applicants for 17 licences, 7.1% drawn, 12 preference points needed

Colorado runs a pure preference-point draw, so the point figure above is the requirement the agency published for that code in that year, not a forecast for the next one. There are 25 further code-and-residency combinations in the recap for this unit. Figures checked against CPW's own statistics pages on 2026-06-09.

Mule Deer Hunting in Unit 40

Unit 40 (Glade Park) sits in Mesa County on the Utah line, with the Colorado River to the north, US 50 to the east and Colo. 141 and the Dolores River to the south. It's about 744 square miles of pinyon-juniper mesa, red rock canyon and desert benches, from roughly 4,700 to 9,000 feet. CPW says most of the unit is private and advises landowner permission before you apply. That decides whether this tag is worth your time.

Where to Find Mule Deer in Glade Park: Canyons, Benches and Private Ground

Start with the hard part. CPW's own unit material says most land in 40 is private and advises landowner permission before you apply. Our ownership read for the unit comes back nearly all private or other. Some named ground below is flagged public in our terrain read, but confirm every parcel on a current ownership map before you plan a hunt around it. CPW publishes no per-unit mule deer breakdown, so what follows comes from the unit's boundary, landforms, elevation and access. Nobody has told us where the deer are by name.

The frame: Colorado River, US 50, Colo. 141 and Utah

CPW's boundary description runs the Colorado River along the north, US 50 along the east, Colo. 141 and the Dolores River along the south, and the Utah line on the west. That's the legal edge, not a deer map. It does tell you how you'll come in. US 50, CO 340 and Redlands Parkway all meet the unit boundary on pavement, and Colo. 141 gives you about 18 miles of paved road along the southern side. Fruita, Loma and Grand Junction are the nearest towns.

Canyon country: Ladder, Sieber, Toms and Kings

Our terrain read marks a string of drainages as holding country. Ladder Canyon sits near 6,100 feet. Sieber (about 5,750), Toms (5,740) and Kings (5,610) step down from there, then Cross Canyon at 5,440 and West Bangs Canyon at 5,170. East Fork Pollock Canyon bottoms out near 4,700, the low end of the unit. Hells Hole, a basin near 5,350, is another. Deer use broken canyon country like this for bedding and cover, with benches and mesa tops above for feed. That's our read, not a CPW statement. Nancy Hanks Gulch (about 6,360) and Ryan Park (about 6,690) fill in the mid-elevation band.

The high end: Snyder Flats, Lost Horse Basin, Oak Hill

Snyder Flats, near 8,370 feet, and Lost Horse Basin, near 7,370, are the higher holding spots. Oak Hill (about 8,380) and Renegade Point (about 8,340) are the high glassing points over them. Early season, with deer still up high, this is where we'd start. If weather pushes them down, expect them to slide toward the mid-elevation canyons above. Unit elevation tops out near 9,060 feet.

Benches and mesas worth a look

Black Ridge (about 7,140) and Clarks Bench (about 7,110) are mid-elevation viewpoints.
Island Mesa (6,800), Miracle Rock (6,750) and The Palisade (6,670) overlook the lower canyon systems.
Long Mesa, Horse Mesa and Wrigley Mesa (5,860 to 5,570) are low-desert vantage points.

Skip anything you can't tie to confirmed public ground or written permission. In a unit this private, a great-looking canyon you can't legally enter is worth nothing.

Unit 40 terrain and land status

Measured from the unit boundary, not from the agency write-up

The lay of it

4,702–9,061 ft on a terrain sample , averaging 6,871 ft ; peaks can run higher. That spread means you can hunt two seasons in one day — plan clothing for both ends.
742 sq mi inside the boundary.

Who owns the ground

Private / Other — 100%

Roughly 0% is public. Carry a land-status layer anyway — these are area percentages, not a map of where the boundaries fall.

Water on the ground

696 tanks
29 springs
2,084 stream segments
27 lakes

Counts from mapping data, so this is how many exist, not how many hold water in a dry year. Sitting water only pays where you find fresh tracks.

Named features inside the unit

Glass from: Piñon Mesa (9,688 ft), Oak Hill (8,376 ft), Renegade Point (8,337 ft), Black Ridge (7,137 ft)

Holding ground: Snyder Flats (8,373 ft), Lost Horse Basin (7,366 ft), Ryan Park (6,688 ft), Horsethief Canyon SWA, Leatha Jean Stassen SWA

Every one of these was tested against the unit polygon before it went on the map. They are starting points, not agency recommendations.

How to Hunt Glade Park Mule Deer: Permission First, Then Glass

Do the paperwork before the hunting. With most of the unit private, your season is decided by phone calls and ownership maps. Make them well ahead of opening day, and ask about vehicle access and retrieval as well as permission. CPW's own advice is to get landowner permission before you apply, and we'd follow it.

Glass from the points, then plan the stalk

The landforms here give you plenty of vantage. Oak Hill and Renegade Point suit the high country around Snyder Flats and Lost Horse Basin. Black Ridge and Clarks Bench look into the mid-elevation drainages. Island Mesa, Miracle Rock and The Palisade cover the lower canyon systems. Be set up before first light. Glass the edges of draws and benches while deer are still feeding. Then pick the canyon where they bed and plan your approach from above.

Canyons like Ladder, Sieber, Toms and Kings run deep, and wind swirls in them. Morning thermals generally flow upslope and evening ones downslope. Stay above or level with bedded deer where you can, and don't walk a canyon floor to find them. Open country means long sight lines, so be ready for a long shot. Archery hunters should expect to work close to bedding cover, where rim edges and benches break up the approach.

Water: tanks and named springs

Our terrain read counts 696 tanks and 29 springs across the unit, a lot of water for arid country. The named springs are Monument, End, Corduroy, Thrailkill, Notch and Big Spring. We can't say where any of them sit relative to deer, and many tanks may be dry or on private ground. Check them on a map and in person before you build a plan around one. Where a spring or tank is on ground you can hunt, glass it at dawn and dusk.

Roads and a realistic day

The named roads are mostly easy. Colo. 141 is paved, and road 4.2, BLM 803, BLM 614 and Wright Draw are graded gravel that a 2WD and small trailer can handle. We don't have anything on how they hold up after rain, so check conditions before you commit. A realistic day: drive in the dark, hike to a point and glass until mid-morning, then still-hunt or stalk the nearest canyon edge on your permitted ground. Back out by the same route. Expect low pressure from other hunters, since the access is private and legal ground is limited. Expect to spend your hours scouting parcels as much as glassing deer.

Getting in and staying out: unit 40

Named routes and what they need

CO 141 — 18 mi · Paved (all rigs)
4.2 — 7.7 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
CO 141;BLM P2014 — 6.3 mi · Paved (all rigs)
BLM 803 — 1.9 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
BLM 614 — 1.6 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
Wright Draw — 1.5 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)

Ratings come from road data, not from a drive this season. Check current conditions with the managing office before you commit a trailer.

Nearest services

Fruita — 14.9 mi · groceries, gear
Orchard Mesa — 15.2 mi · groceries, gear
Grand Junction — 15.4 mi · groceries, gear
Loma — 16.9 mi · no services listed
Fruitvale — 19 mi · groceries, gear

Developed camps

Unnamed camp site
Unnamed camp site
Bull Draw
Rattlesnake
Banjo

Season weather and signal

Jan39° / 16° · 0.9" precip
Aug89° / 58° · 1" precip
Sep80° / 49° · 1.3" precip
Oct66° / 37° · 1.4" precip
Nov51° / 27° · 0.9" precip
Dec39° / 17° · 0.9" precip

Best signal is Verizon at about 21% of the unit. Plan on being out of contact and tell someone your route.

Colorado rules that decide your day

Summarised from CPW regulations. They change — read the current regulations and your permit-tag before you hunt.

Legal shooting hours

Big game may be taken from half an hour before sunrise to half an hour after sunset.

Motorized retrieval

Tagging

Validate and attach your carcass tag before the animal is moved, and keep evidence of sex attached until the carcass reaches your home or a processor.

Leaving meat

Abandoning edible meat is illegal. CPW counts the four quarters and the loins.

Where you may not shoot

Occupied structures — No discharging a firearm within 50 yards of a developed campsite, and never toward an occupied building.
Roads — No shooting from or across a public road, and no shooting from a motor vehicle.

Mule Deer: where to put the shot

Broadside or quartering away, on the back edge of the front leg about a third of the way up the body.

Shots to refuse

Nothing behind or overlapping the animal you picked.
Your maximum range is the farthest you have shot a three-shot group into a paper plate from the rest you are carrying.
Pass the shot you are talking yourself into.

Plan the carry: roughly 40– 120 lb of boned-out meat, before head and hide — two large coolers. ProHunt planning estimate, not an agency figure.

Pro Members Only

Unlock mule deer hunting tactics for Unit 40

Upgrade to Pro — $49/yr

Mule Deer Success Rates

All manners of take74%

Archery65%

Rifle75%

CPW's 2023 harvest estimates put mule deer success in unit 40 at 74% — 275 animals taken by 372 hunters. The hunter count is large enough for the percentage to mean something and small enough that a good or bad year still moves it.

Archery — 65% success, 44 taken by 67 hunters
Rifle — 75% success, 209 taken by 277 hunters

Mule Deer Draw Odds

Season	Tags	Applicants	Draw %	Pts Req
Archery — 1st Season buck only (resident)	39	202	19.3%	3
Archery — 1st Season buck only (nonresident)	14	76	18.4%	4
Muzzleloader — 1st Season buck only (resident)	18	89	20.2%	3
Muzzleloader — 1st Season buck only (nonresident)	6	40	15.0%	7
Rifle — 2nd Season buck only (resident)	61	322	18.9%	3
Rifle — 2nd Season buck only (nonresident)	24	165	14.5%	7
Rifle — 3rd Season buck only (resident)	56	449	12.5%	4
Rifle — 3rd Season buck only (nonresident)	20	254	7.9%	14
Rifle — 4th Season buck only (resident)	7	220	3.2%	13
Rifle — 4th Season buck only (nonresident)	1	98	1.0%	28
Rifle — 2nd Season buck only (resident)	7	67	10.4%	3
Rifle — 2nd Season buck only (nonresident)	9	26	34.6%	3
Rifle — 3rd Season buck only (resident)	10	100	10.0%	2
Rifle — 3rd Season buck only (nonresident)	5	17	29.4%	3
Rifle — 1st Season buck only (resident)	2	83	2.4%	23
Rifle — 1st Season buck only (nonresident)	0	0	0.0%	—

Data from 2026 draw results. Each row is one residency pool — read the label before the number.

Open in Draw Odds Engine

CPW's 2026 draw recap for mule deer in unit 40, by hunt code, with resident and nonresident kept apart because the two draw from different licence pools:

DM040O3R — Rifle, 3rd Season, Buck Only, resident: 449 applicants for 56 licences, 12.5% drawn, 4 preference points needed
DM040O2R — Rifle, 2nd Season, Buck Only, resident: 322 applicants for 61 licences, 18.9% drawn, 3 preference points needed
DM040O3R — Rifle, 3rd Season, Buck Only, nonresident: 254 applicants for 20 licences, 7.9% drawn, 14 preference points needed
DM040O4R — Rifle, 4th Season, Buck Only, resident: 220 applicants for 7 licences, 3.2% drawn, 13 preference points needed

Colorado runs a pure preference-point draw, so the point figure above is the requirement the agency published for that code in that year, not a forecast for the next one. There are 11 further code-and-residency combinations in the recap for this unit. Figures checked against CPW's own statistics pages on 2026-06-09.

Bear Hunting in Unit 40

Unit 40 (Glade Park) sits on the Utah line in Mesa County, west of Grand Junction. It runs from the Colorado River south to Colo. 141 and the Dolores River, across pinyon-juniper mesas and red rock canyons. CPW publishes no per-unit bear breakdown and no harvest figures we can lean on. What decides this tag is access: CPW says most of the unit is private and advises getting landowner permission before you apply.

Where to Find Bears in Glade Park: Piñon Mesa Down to the Canyon Benches

Start with the hard fact. CPW's own unit material says most land in 40 is private and that landowner permission is advisable before you apply. We'd take that seriously. Our terrain read can't give us a clean public-land percentage here, so pull a current ownership map and mark your parcels before you put a dollar on this tag.

CPW also doesn't break this unit down for bear. No narrative, no named drainages, no harvest numbers. What follows comes from the boundary, the landforms and the water, not from anyone's bear counts.

The Frame: Colorado River, US 50, Colo. 141 and Utah

The legal boundary runs the Colorado River on the north, US 50 on the east, Colo. 141 and the Dolores River on the south, and the Utah line on the west. Those are edges, not bear sign. They do tell you how to get in. Colo. 141 gives about 18 paved miles along the south side, and US 50, CO 340 and Redlands Parkway all meet the unit on the north and east. Fruita, Loma, Orchard Mesa and Grand Junction are your nearby towns.

Piñon Mesa and the High Ground

The unit tops out at 9,061 feet and averages about 6,871, so the high country is the cooler, greener end of it. Piñon Mesa is the big landmark. Oak Hill (8,376 feet) and Renegade Point (8,337) are mapped as glassing summits. Snyder Flats, at 8,373, and Lost Horse Basin, at 7,366, read as holding country: flat ground and a basin where cover and moisture should collect. If we wanted bears feeding on natural forage, this is where we'd spend the first day. Check the ownership of every access route up there first.

Canyon Country Below

The lower half is cut by named canyons: Ladder (6,143), Sieber (5,748), Toms (5,736), Kings (5,610), Cross (5,439), West Bangs (5,169) and East Fork Pollock (4,701). Nancy Hanks Gulch (6,364), Ryan Park (6,688) and Hells Hole (5,346) round out the holding list. Canyon bottoms with water are where a bear gets through dry country. We count roughly 29 springs on our terrain read, including Monument, End, Corduroy, Thrailkill, Notch and Big Spring, plus hundreds of stock tanks nobody has verified for us. Treat any of them as a lead, not a promise.

What to Skip

Skip the low, open benches and flats unless you've got a landowner's yes. They're easy to reach and easy to glass, and they're the likeliest private ground.

Unit 40 terrain and land status

Measured from the unit boundary, not from the agency write-up

The lay of it

4,702–9,061 ft on a terrain sample , averaging 6,871 ft ; peaks can run higher. That spread means you can hunt two seasons in one day — plan clothing for both ends.
742 sq mi inside the boundary.

Who owns the ground

Private / Other — 100%

Roughly 0% is public. Carry a land-status layer anyway — these are area percentages, not a map of where the boundaries fall.

Water on the ground

696 tanks
29 springs
2,084 stream segments
27 lakes

Counts from mapping data, so this is how many exist, not how many hold water in a dry year. Sitting water only pays where you find fresh tracks.

Named features inside the unit

Glass from: Piñon Mesa (9,688 ft), Oak Hill (8,376 ft), Renegade Point (8,337 ft), Black Ridge (7,137 ft)

Holding ground: Snyder Flats (8,373 ft), Lost Horse Basin (7,366 ft), Ryan Park (6,688 ft), Horsethief Canyon SWA, Leatha Jean Stassen SWA

Every one of these was tested against the unit polygon before it went on the map. They are starting points, not agency recommendations.

How to Hunt Bears Around Piñon Mesa and the Glade Park Canyons

Plan this as a permission hunt first and a bear hunt second. Spend your scouting time on the phone and on the map before you spend it in the truck.

Lock Down Access Before You Go

Knock on doors, or call, well ahead of the season. Ask which canyons and benches the landowner will let you walk, and whether they'll allow vehicles or foot travel only. Where a road does cross public ground, the ones we can name are BLM 803, BLM 614, Wright Draw and a 7.7-mile graded gravel road numbered 4.2. All rate as graded gravel, fine for 2WD and a small trailer, but conditions change fast on desert clay when it rains. Confirm ownership on each before you commit to it.

Glass From the Points

The landform list gives you plenty of high ground for optics: Oak Hill, Renegade Point, Black Ridge (7,137), Clarks Bench (7,110), Island Mesa (6,800) and Miracle Rock (6,747). Pick one that overlooks a drainage you've got permission on. Be on it before first light and glass the oak and brushy draw edges as the light comes up. Then again in the last couple of hours of evening. Midday, bears are usually bedded in shade, so use that time to move or to scout the next canyon.

Hunt the Water and the Cover

This is dry country, and the water count matters. Sit a spring or tank with a clear view, downwind, well back. Canyon bottoms like Ladder, Sieber and Toms funnel movement. Morning thermals pull up-canyon and evening air drops down, so set your approach with that in mind. A bear in a narrow canyon smells you long before it sees you.

A Realistic Day

Expect low numbers of other hunters, long glassing sits and a lot of hiking. We wouldn't plan on seeing a bear every day. CPW gives no success rate for this unit, so don't plan around one. Check the current regulations brochure for seasons, legal methods and any required bear-identification or reporting rules before you go. Have a pack-out plan ready for a bear taken deep in a canyon, since you may have a long carry back to a road.

Getting in and staying out: unit 40

Named routes and what they need

CO 141 — 18 mi · Paved (all rigs)
4.2 — 7.7 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
CO 141;BLM P2014 — 6.3 mi · Paved (all rigs)
BLM 803 — 1.9 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
BLM 614 — 1.6 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
Wright Draw — 1.5 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)

Ratings come from road data, not from a drive this season. Check current conditions with the managing office before you commit a trailer.

Nearest services

Fruita — 14.9 mi · groceries, gear
Orchard Mesa — 15.2 mi · groceries, gear
Grand Junction — 15.4 mi · groceries, gear
Loma — 16.9 mi · no services listed
Fruitvale — 19 mi · groceries, gear

Developed camps

Unnamed camp site
Unnamed camp site
Bull Draw
Rattlesnake
Banjo

Season weather and signal

Jan39° / 16° · 0.9" precip
Aug89° / 58° · 1" precip
Sep80° / 49° · 1.3" precip
Oct66° / 37° · 1.4" precip
Nov51° / 27° · 0.9" precip
Dec39° / 17° · 0.9" precip

Best signal is Verizon at about 21% of the unit. Plan on being out of contact and tell someone your route.

Colorado rules that decide your day

Summarised from CPW regulations. They change — read the current regulations and your permit-tag before you hunt.

Legal shooting hours

Big game may be taken from half an hour before sunrise to half an hour after sunset.

Motorized retrieval

Tagging

Validate and attach your carcass tag before the animal is moved, and keep evidence of sex attached until the carcass reaches your home or a processor.

Leaving meat

Abandoning edible meat is illegal. CPW counts the four quarters and the loins.

Where you may not shoot

Occupied structures — No discharging a firearm within 50 yards of a developed campsite, and never toward an occupied building.
Roads — No shooting from or across a public road, and no shooting from a motor vehicle.

Bear: where to put the shot

Broadside or quartering away, on the back edge of the front leg about a third of the way up the body.

Shots to refuse

Nothing behind or overlapping the animal you picked.
Your maximum range is the farthest you have shot a three-shot group into a paper plate from the rest you are carrying.
Pass the shot you are talking yourself into.

Plan the carry: roughly 40– 120 lb of boned-out meat, before head and hide — two large coolers. ProHunt planning estimate, not an agency figure.

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Bear Success Rates

CPW's 2023 harvest estimates carry no black bear row for unit 40 that we can read back to this unit on its own. Where the agency reports a unit inside a grouping, or prints a table our parser cannot resolve to a single column, we leave the number out rather than publish a statewide average as though it had been measured here. CPW's current harvest estimates are the place to check before you apply.

Bear Draw Odds

Season	Tags	Applicants	Draw %	Pts Req
Archery — 1st Season either sex (resident)	18	20	90.0%	—
Archery — 1st Season either sex (nonresident)	7	7	100.0%	—
Muzzleloader — 1st Season either sex (resident)	2	2	100.0%	—
Muzzleloader — 1st Season either sex (nonresident)	1	1	100.0%	—
Rifle — 1st Season either sex (resident)	86	151	57.0%	—
Rifle — 1st Season either sex (nonresident)	8	18	44.4%	—

Data from 2026 draw results. Each row is one residency pool — read the label before the number.

Open in Draw Odds Engine

CPW's 2026 draw recap for black bear in unit 40, by hunt code, with resident and nonresident kept apart because the two draw from different licence pools:

BE040O1R — Rifle, 1st Season, Either Sex, resident: 151 applicants for 86 licences, 57% drawn, no preference points needed
BE040O1A — Archery, 1st Season, Either Sex, resident: 20 applicants for 18 licences, 90% drawn, no preference points needed
BE040O1R — Rifle, 1st Season, Either Sex, nonresident: 18 applicants for 8 licences, 44.4% drawn, no preference points needed
BE040O1A — Archery, 1st Season, Either Sex, nonresident: 7 applicants for 7 licences, 100% drawn, no preference points needed

No preference points were needed for the codes above in that year, which can change the moment applicant numbers do. There are 2 further code-and-residency combinations in the recap for this unit. Figures checked against CPW's own statistics pages on 2026-06-09.

Unit Logistics & Expectations

Planning Notes

⛺

Camp Sites

44 developed campgrounds in or beside the unit, including Bull Draw, Rattlesnake and Banjo.

🛣️

Road Conditions

CO 141, 4.2 and CO 141 / BLM P2014 are the named routes in the unit. Roughly 26 mi paved, 9 mi gravel and 0 mi four-wheel-drive.

🥾

Terrain Difficulty

4,702–9,061 ft, averaging 6,871. More than 4,000 feet of relief, so plan the pack-out before the shot.

👥

Hunting Pressure

Our land-status read for this unit is approximate, so treat any pressure estimate from it with suspicion and check a current ownership layer.

🌦️

Weather

Season normals: Sep 80/49°F, 1.3 in.; Oct 66/37°F, 1.4 in.; Nov 51/27°F, 0.9 in..

📱

Cell Service

Verizon 21%, AT&T 14%, T-Mobile 7% of the unit area — modelled coverage, not measured. Assume no signal off the paved road.

🏘️

Nearest Town

Fruita (15 mi), Orchard Mesa (15 mi), Grand Junction (15 mi)

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Frequently Asked Questions

Where is Colorado unit 40?

Unit 40 lies in Mesa County, and CPW has it bounded on the north by Colorado River; on the east by U.S. 50; on the south by Colo. 141 and Dolores River; on the west by UT. It covers about 742 square miles.

What is the elk success rate in unit 40?

CPW's 2023 harvest estimates put elk success in unit 40 at 60% across all manners of take, and archery 74%, muzzleloader 60% and rifle 58% by weapon. Those are the agency's own figures for this unit, not a statewide average.

Where do you stay and resupply for a unit 40 hunt?

The nearest services our logistics pipeline finds for unit 40 are at Fruita, about 15 miles from the unit's centre, with Orchard Mesa at about 15 miles. There are also 44 developed campgrounds in or beside the unit.

Can you hunt unit 40 on public land?

CPW marks this unit: landowner permission is advisable before applying. Most land is private. Settle access before you apply rather than after you draw.

What is the mule deer success rate in unit 40?

CPW's 2023 harvest estimates put mule deer success in unit 40 at 74% across all manners of take, and archery 65% and rifle 75% by weapon. Those are the agency's own figures for this unit, not a statewide average.

What is the black bear success rate in unit 40?

CPW publishes no black bear success figure we can tie to unit 40 on its own — the 2023 harvest tables either omit the unit or report it in a grouping we could not read back to it reliably. Rather than quote a statewide average as though it were measured here, we say so. Check CPW's current harvest estimates before you apply.

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Sources & Verification

Every fact on this page is tied to a primary source below. Last fact-checked 2026-10-23.

Colorado Big Game Hunting Brochure — Game Management Unit (GMU) Descriptions (pp. 79-80-81-82) — Colorado Parks and Wildlife · supports: GMU boundary description, Counties the unit lies in, Data analysis unit (DAU) the unit belongs to, CPW's private-land note for the unit · accessed 2026-10-22
2023 Colorado Elk Harvest Estimates — Colorado Parks and Wildlife · supports: Percent success for elk in unit 40, Hunters and harvest by weapon and season · accessed 2026-10-22
CPW CPWAdminData feature service — GMU and sheep/goat unit boundaries — Colorado Parks and Wildlife GIS Unit · supports: Mapped extent of the unit, Which named ground falls inside the unit line · accessed 2026-10-22
2023 Colorado Deer Harvest Estimates — Colorado Parks and Wildlife · supports: Percent success for mule deer in unit 40, Hunters and harvest by weapon and season · accessed 2026-10-22

Unit 40 (Glade Park)

Build your own PDF hunt guide for Unit 40

Elk Hunting in Unit 40

Where to Find Elk in Unit 40: Private-Land Reality and the Mesa Country

Snyder Flats and Oak Hill: the high ground

Lost Horse Basin, Ryan Park and Nancy Hanks Gulch

The canyon tier: Ladder, Sieber, Toms, Kings and Cross

Water and roads

Unit 40 terrain and land status

The lay of it

Who owns the ground

Water on the ground

Named features inside the unit

How to Hunt Elk in Unit 40: Glass the Mesas, Lock Down Access

Elk Success Rates

Elk Draw Odds

Mule Deer Hunting in Unit 40

Where to Find Mule Deer in Glade Park: Canyons, Benches and Private Ground

The frame: Colorado River, US 50, Colo. 141 and Utah

Canyon country: Ladder, Sieber, Toms and Kings

The high end: Snyder Flats, Lost Horse Basin, Oak Hill

Benches and mesas worth a look

Unit 40 terrain and land status

The lay of it

Who owns the ground

Water on the ground

Named features inside the unit

How to Hunt Glade Park Mule Deer: Permission First, Then Glass

Mule Deer Success Rates

Mule Deer Draw Odds

Bear Hunting in Unit 40

Where to Find Bears in Glade Park: Piñon Mesa Down to the Canyon Benches

The Frame: Colorado River, US 50, Colo. 141 and Utah

Piñon Mesa and the High Ground

Canyon Country Below

What to Skip

Unit 40 terrain and land status

The lay of it

Who owns the ground

Water on the ground

Named features inside the unit

How to Hunt Bears Around Piñon Mesa and the Glade Park Canyons

Bear Success Rates

Bear Draw Odds

Unit Logistics & Expectations

Explore Related Units

Unit 10 — Elk

Unit 12 — Elk

Unit 40 — Mule Deer

Frequently Asked Questions

Free Hunt Planning Tools

Plan Your Hunt with ProHunt Pro

Sources & Verification