Unit 45
Colorado Hunting Guide — Elk
Unit 45 lies in Eagle and Pitkin counties and covers about 335 square miles. Ground runs from 7,366 to 13,965 feet. CPW bounds it by Eagle River-Tenmile Creek divide and Continental Divide among others. CPW's harvest estimates put elk success here as high as 33%. Federal land covers about 95% of it. Check land status on a current map before you plan a route.
Build your own PDF hunt guide for Unit 45
Answer a few questions about your tag, your season and your rig, and the Field Intelligence Report builds a print-ready Colorado Unit 45 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.
Free accounts get one report a year with the top spot unlocked. ProHunt Pro includes unlimited reports, all three spots, the full camp plan, and GPX/KML downloads for onX and Google Earth. Prefer to see one first? Open the builder and pick any unit.
Elk Hunting in Unit 45
Unit 45 lies in Eagle and Pitkin counties and covers about 335 square miles. Ground runs from 7,366 to 13,965 feet. CPW bounds it by Eagle River-Tenmile Creek divide and Continental Divide among others. CPW's harvest estimates put elk success here as high as 33%. Federal land covers about 95% of it. Check land status on a current map before you plan a route.
Where to Find Elk in Unit 45
CPW draws an exact line around unit 45 and says nothing about where the elk stand inside it. So the ground below is the unit's own and the read on where to start is ours, labelled as such. The unit lies in Eagle and Pitkin counties. It runs to about 335 square miles.
The lines of the unit: Eagle River-Tenmile Creek divide, Continental Divide and East Lake Creek
CPW has unit 45 bounded on the north by Eagle River from East Lake Creek to Dowd Junction, I-70 from Dowd Junction to Eagle River-Tenmile Creek divide; on the east by Eagle River-Tenmile Creek divide; on the south by Continental Divide; on the west by divide between Chance Creek-North Fork Fryingpan-Cunningham Creek drainages and East Lake Creek. Read it as a frame, not as a hint about animals. Its value is practical — those are the features you will navigate by, and the ridges that separate one day's country from another's.
High ground inside the line: Mount of the Holy Cross, Holy Cross Ridge and Mount Jackson
Named high points inside the unit include Mount of the Holy Cross at 13,965 feet, Holy Cross Ridge at 13,965 feet, Mount Jackson at 13,648 feet, Whitney Peak at 13,275 feet and Notch Mountain at 13,224 feet. Several carry a public-land flag in our data, which makes them the first places to try for a view. Elk want timber to bed in and open ground to feed on, within a short walk of each other.
Holding ground: Two Elk Pass, China Bowl and Tennessee Pass
Below them sit Two Elk Pass at 10,994 feet, China Bowl at 10,625 feet, Tennessee Pass at 10,430 feet, Northeast Bowl at 10,295 feet and Sunup Bowl at 10,216 feet. Those are the basins, parks and bottoms this unit has, and they are what you glass into from above. Pick the one with the least road on its upwind side.
Public ground to start from: Whiskey Creek STL
CPW lists Whiskey Creek STL inside this unit as ground open to public hunting. Each property sets its own restrictions, and the agency's page for it is where they are written down. Federal land covers about 95% of the unit on top of those.
Water: Mud Spring and McCoy Spring
The water inside the unit line comes to 4,022 mapped stream reaches, 36 lakes and 686 stock tanks. Named sources include Mud Spring and McCoy Spring. On ground with that many tanks, knowing which two or three hold water in your season is the most useful thing a scouting trip can tell you.
The herd this unit belongs to: E-16
CPW does not manage elk unit by unit. It manages them as data analysis unit E-16, and unit 45 is one piece of it. The rest of E-16 is unit 44, unit 47 and unit 444. Read a neighbour in the same herd before you read the state average — the herd, not the unit line, is what the agency is steering.
Unit 45 terrain and land status
Measured from the unit boundary, not from the agency write-up
The lay of it
- 9,018–12,334 ft on a terrain sample , averaging 10,581 ft ; peaks can run higher.
- 335.4 sq mi inside the boundary.
Who owns the ground
- National Forest — 60%
- State Trust — 8%
- Private / Other — 32%
Roughly 68% is public. Carry a land-status layer anyway — these are area percentages, not a map of where the boundaries fall.
Water on the ground
- 686 tanks
- 4,022 stream segments
- 36 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: Mount of the Holy Cross (13,965 ft), Mount Jackson (13,648 ft), Whitney Peak (13,275 ft), Savage Peak (13,120 ft)
Holding ground: Fall Creek Pass (12,824 ft), Fancy Pass (12,407 ft), Half Moon Pass (11,640 ft), Whiskey Creek STL, Mud Spring
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 45
Elk Success Rates
CPW's 2023 harvest estimates put elk success in unit 45 at 15% — 101 animals taken by 698 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 — 8% success, 20 taken by 249 hunters
- Muzzleloader — 33% success, 14 taken by 42 hunters
- Rifle — 16% success, 67 taken by 407 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rifle — 4th Season bull only (resident) | 18 | 44 | 40.9% | — |
| Rifle — 4th Season bull only (nonresident) | 7 | 9 | 77.8% | — |
| Rifle — 2nd Season cow only (resident) | 123 | 218 | 56.4% | — |
| Rifle — 2nd Season cow only (nonresident) | 10 | 22 | 45.5% | — |
| Rifle — 3rd Season cow only (resident) | 71 | 145 | 49.0% | — |
| Rifle — 3rd Season cow only (nonresident) | 1 | 3 | 33.3% | — |
| Rifle — 4th Season cow only (resident) | 19 | 53 | 35.8% | — |
| Rifle — 4th Season cow only (nonresident) | 0 | 3 | 0.0% | — |
Data from 2026 draw results. Each row is one residency pool — read the label before the number.
Open in Draw Odds EngineCPW's 2026 draw recap for elk in unit 45, by hunt code, with resident and nonresident kept apart because the two draw from different licence pools:
- EF045O2R — Rifle, 2nd Season, Cow Only, resident: 218 applicants for 123 licences, 56.4% drawn, no preference points needed
- EF045O3R — Rifle, 3rd Season, Cow Only, resident: 145 applicants for 71 licences, 49% drawn, no preference points needed
- EF045O4R — Rifle, 4th Season, Cow Only, resident: 53 applicants for 19 licences, 35.8% drawn, no preference points needed
- EM045O4R — Rifle, 4th Season, Bull Only, resident: 44 applicants for 18 licences, 40.9% 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 4 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
Frequently Asked Questions
Where is Colorado unit 45?
What is the elk success rate in unit 45?
Where do you stay and resupply for a unit 45 hunt?
Plan Your Hunt with ProHunt Pro
Unlock advanced tactics, the Tag-to-Trail Planner, AI hunt strategy assistant, and personalized camp and trip execution plans.
Upgrade to Pro — $49/yrSources & 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 · accessed 2026-10-22
- 2023 Colorado Elk Harvest Estimates — Colorado Parks and Wildlife · supports: Percent success for elk in unit 45, 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