Unit 580 (East Slope Crazy Mountains)
Montana Hunting Guide — Elk, Mule Deer, Whitetail
Unit 580 lies in Meagher, Park, Sweet Grass and Wheatland counties and covers about 1,125 square miles. Ground runs from 4,495 to 9,195 feet. Montana FWP publishes no per-unit elk success figure we can verify for this unit. Check land status on a current map before you plan a route.
Build your own PDF hunt guide for Unit 580
Answer a few questions about your tag, your season and your rig, and the Field Intelligence Report builds a print-ready Montana Unit 580 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.
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Elk Hunting in Unit 580
Unit 580 lies in Meagher, Park, Sweet Grass and Wheatland counties and covers about 1,125 square miles. Ground runs from 4,495 to 9,195 feet. Montana FWP publishes no per-unit elk success figure we can verify for this unit. Check land status on a current map before you plan a route.
Where to Find Elk in Unit 580
Montana FWP's material on unit 580 stops at the boundary — there is no agency account of where its elk live. Every place named below sits inside the unit line. Which of them holds animals in your season is for you to find out. The unit lies in Meagher, Park, Sweet Grass and Wheatland counties. It runs to about 1,125 square miles.
The lines of the unit: Sixteenmile Creek, Yellowstone River and Duck Creek
Montana FWP draws unit 580 in Meagher, Park, Sweet Grass and Wheatland counties with a boundary that runs on US Highway 89, Route 294, US Highway 12 and US Highway 191, and on Sixteenmile Creek, Yellowstone River, Duck Creek and Crazy Mountain Divide, walked corner by corner in its hunting district legal descriptions. It tells you the shape of the unit and nothing about its inhabitants. 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: Crazy Peak, Crazy Mountains and Big Timber Peak
Named high points inside the unit include Crazy Peak at 11,179 feet, Crazy Mountains at 11,143 feet, Big Timber Peak at 10,751 feet, Conical Peak at 10,747 feet and Fairview Peak at 10,154 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: Sawmill Gulch, Rough Gulch and Big Timber Canyon
Below them sit Sawmill Gulch at 5,809 feet, Rough Gulch at 5,627 feet, Big Timber Canyon at 5,498 feet, Willis Coulee at 4,523 feet and Long Gulch at 4,498 feet. That is the low country of the unit — the ground animals drop into when they are pushed or when the weather turns. Pick the one with the least road on its upwind side.
Water: Spruce Springs
The water inside the unit line comes to 834 mapped stream reaches, 35 lakes, 201 stock tanks and 5 springs. Named sources include Spruce Springs. 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.
Reading the land status
Our ownership read for this unit is approximate — it comes out as National Forest 60%, Private / Other 32% and State Trust 8%, so treat it as a starting point and check a current land-status layer before you plan a route. The unit runs from 4,495 feet to 9,195 feet, averaging 5,935 — that is a lot of vertical to cover, and it means the season you draw decides which half of the unit you hunt.
Unit 580 terrain and land status
Measured from the unit boundary, not from the agency write-up
The lay of it
- 4,495–9,195 ft on a terrain sample , averaging 5,935 ft ; peaks can run higher. That spread means you can hunt two seasons in one day — plan clothing for both ends.
- 1,124.5 sq mi inside the boundary. Big enough that picking one drainage beats driving three.
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
- 201 tanks
- 5 springs
- 834 stream segments
- 35 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: Big Timber Peak (10,751 ft), Fairview Peak (10,154 ft), Sunlight Peak (10,037 ft), Loco Mountain (9,243 ft)
Holding ground: Wolf Park (7,222 ft), The Park (6,412 ft), Spruce Springs
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 580
Elk Success Rates
Montana FWP's 2023 harvest estimates carry no elk row for unit 580 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. Montana FWP's current harvest estimates are the place to check before you apply.
Elk Draw Odds
Draw odds data not available for this specific unit/species combination in our database.
Search Montana Draw OddsMontana FWP's draw recap has no elk record we can tie to unit 580. That usually means the licence is sold over the counter, is issued under a hunt code covering several units, or was not offered in the years we hold. Rather than estimate a point requirement, we leave it blank — check Montana FWP's own draw recap for the hunt code you mean to apply for.
Unit Logistics & Expectations
Frequently Asked Questions
Where is Colorado unit 580?
What is the elk success rate in unit 580?
Where do you stay and resupply for a unit 580 hunt?
What is the mule deer success rate in unit 580?
What is the whitetail success rate in unit 580?
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Upgrade to Pro — $49/yrSources & Verification
Every fact on this page is tied to a primary source below. Last fact-checked 2026-10-24.
- Montana FWP Hunting District Legal Descriptions, 2026/2027 — deer-elk hunting districts (pp. 19-35) — Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks · supports: GMU boundary description, Counties the unit lies in · accessed 2026-10-24
- FWP hunting district feature services — deer/elk, antelope, moose, bighorn sheep and mountain goat districts (2026 and 2027 seasons) — Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks · supports: Mapped extent of the unit, Which named ground falls inside the unit line · accessed 2026-10-24