Unit 461
Colorado Hunting Guide — Elk
Unit 461 lies in Jefferson and Park counties and covers about 143 square miles. Ground runs from 5,444 to 9,386 feet. CPW bounds it by Colo. 7 and South Platte River among others. CPW's harvest estimates put elk success here as high as 19%. Most of the unit is private, so access comes before tactics. Check land status on a current map before you plan a route.
Build your own PDF hunt guide for Unit 461
Answer a few questions about your tag, your season and your rig, and the Field Intelligence Report builds a print-ready Colorado Unit 461 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 461
Unit 461 lies in Jefferson and Park counties and covers about 143 square miles. Ground runs from 5,444 to 9,386 feet. CPW bounds it by Colo. 7 and South Platte River among others. CPW's harvest estimates put elk success here as high as 19%. Most of the unit is private, so access comes before tactics. Check land status on a current map before you plan a route.
Where to Find Elk in Unit 461
What CPW publishes for unit 461 is a boundary, not a elk map. 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 Jefferson and Park counties. It runs to about 143 square miles.
The lines of the unit: Colo. 7, South Platte River and North Fork of South Platte River
CPW has unit 461 bounded on the north by Jefferson CRs 122 (South Turkey Creek Canyon) & 124 (Deer Creek Canyon) and Colo. 7 & 470; on the east by South Platte River; on the south by North Fork of South Platte River; W by U.S. 285. Read it as a frame, not as a hint about animals. What it does give you is the way in: the rivers and highways you cross, and the divides that decide which drainage you end up in.
High ground inside the line: Riley Peak, Mount Bailey and Legault Mountain
Named high points inside the unit include Riley Peak at 9,386 feet, Mount Bailey at 9,071 feet, Legault Mountain at 9,044 feet, Crow Hill at 8,690 feet and Huebner Peak at 8,638 feet. Several carry a public-land flag in our data, which makes them the first places to try for a view. Elk on low, open country live on distance and visibility, so they see you first.
Holding ground: Raymers Gulch, Shattuck Gulch and Deep Gulch
Below them sit Raymers Gulch at 7,666 feet, Shattuck Gulch at 7,523 feet, Deep Gulch at 7,372 feet, Elkhorn Gulch at 7,228 feet and Deer Gulch at 7,073 feet. These are the folds worth watching, and the ones other hunters walk past on the way to somewhere steeper. Two you can watch from a single knob is worth more than five you have to drive between.
The herd this unit belongs to: E-39
CPW does not manage elk unit by unit. It manages them as data analysis unit E-39, and unit 461 is one piece of it. The rest of E-39 is unit 39, unit 46 and unit 391. That matters twice over: the population objective and the licence numbers are set for the whole area, and the animals move across unit lines inside it without noticing them.
Before you apply: who owns this unit
CPW marks this unit: landowner permission is advisable before applying. Most land is private. Our ownership read for this unit is approximate — it comes out as National Forest 60%, Private / Other 17%, BLM 15% and State Trust 8%, so treat it as a starting point and check a current land-status layer before you plan a route. A grid sample of the unit reads 5,637 to 8,512 feet, and named ground inside the line runs 5,444 to 9,386 feet — take 5,444 to 9,386 as the spread, because the sample is a grid and misses both ends. With 3,942 feet between the two ends, there is enough relief to separate summer range from winter range.
Unit 461 terrain and land status
Measured from the unit boundary, not from the agency write-up
The lay of it
- 5,637–8,512 ft on a terrain sample , averaging 7,378 ft ; peaks can run higher.
- 143.4 sq mi inside the boundary.
Who owns the ground
- National Forest — 60%
- BLM — 15%
- State Trust — 8%
- Private / Other — 17%
Roughly 83% is public. Carry a land-status layer anyway — these are area percentages, not a map of where the boundaries fall.
Water on the ground
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: Crow Hill (8,690 ft), Turkshead Peak (7,734 ft)
Holding ground: Brush Gulch (7,787 ft), Beaver Gulch (7,058 ft), Bear Gulch (5,644 ft)
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 461
Elk Success Rates
CPW's 2023 harvest estimates put elk success in unit 461 at 12% — 16 animals taken by 128 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 — 0% success, 0 taken by 34 hunters
- Muzzleloader — 0% success, 0 taken by 11 hunters
- Rifle — 19% success, 16 taken by 83 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) | 46 | 59 | 78.0% | — |
| Archery — 1st Season either sex (nonresident) | 2 | 3 | 66.7% | — |
| Rifle — 1st Season cow only (resident) | 2 | 7 | 28.6% | — |
| Rifle — 1st Season cow only (nonresident) | 0 | 2 | 0.0% | — |
| Rifle — 5th Season cow only (resident) | 20 | 99 | 20.2% | — |
| Rifle — 5th Season cow only (nonresident) | 0 | 0 | 0.0% | — |
| Rifle — 1st Season bull only (resident) | 5 | 21 | 23.8% | — |
| Rifle — 1st Season bull only (nonresident) | 2 | 3 | 66.7% | — |
| Rifle — 2nd Season cow only (resident) | 1 | 3 | 33.3% | — |
| Rifle — 2nd Season cow only (nonresident) | 0 | 0 | 0.0% | — |
| Rifle — 3rd Season cow only (resident) | 1 | 5 | 20.0% | — |
| Rifle — 3rd Season cow only (nonresident) | 0 | 0 | 0.0% | — |
| Rifle — 2nd Season bull only (resident) | 8 | 29 | 27.6% | — |
| Rifle — 2nd Season bull only (nonresident) | 1 | 1 | 100.0% | — |
| Rifle — 3rd Season bull only (resident) | 9 | 21 | 42.9% | — |
| Rifle — 3rd Season bull only (nonresident) | 0 | 0 | 0.0% | — |
| Rifle — 4th Season bull only (resident) | 9 | 19 | 47.4% | — |
| Rifle — 4th Season bull only (nonresident) | 0 | 0 | 0.0% | — |
| Rifle — 4th Season cow only (resident) | 1 | 1 | 100.0% | — |
| Rifle — 4th Season cow only (nonresident) | 0 | 0 | 0.0% | — |
| Muzzleloader — 1st Season bull only (resident) | 7 | 10 | 70.0% | — |
| Muzzleloader — 1st Season bull only (nonresident) | 0 | 0 | 0.0% | — |
| Muzzleloader — 1st Season cow only (resident) | 1 | 5 | 20.0% | — |
| Muzzleloader — 1st Season cow 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 EngineCPW's 2026 draw recap for elk in unit 461, by hunt code, with resident and nonresident kept apart because the two draw from different licence pools:
- EF461P5R — Rifle, 5th Season, Cow Only, resident: 99 applicants for 20 licences, 20.2% drawn, no preference points needed
- EE461O1A — Archery, 1st Season, Either Sex, resident: 59 applicants for 46 licences, 78% drawn, no preference points needed
- EM461O2R — Rifle, 2nd Season, Bull Only, resident: 29 applicants for 8 licences, 27.6% drawn, no preference points needed
- EM461O1R — Rifle, 1st Season, Bull Only, resident: 21 applicants for 5 licences, 23.8% 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 10 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 461?
What is the elk success rate in unit 461?
Where do you stay and resupply for a unit 461 hunt?
Can you hunt unit 461 on public land?
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, 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 461, 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