Unit 690 (South Hill-Blaine-Chouteau)
Montana Hunting Guide — Elk
Unit 690 lies in Hill, Blaine and Chouteau counties and covers about 4,359 square miles. Ground runs from 2,689 to 4,770 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 690
Answer a few questions about your tag, your season and your rig, and the Field Intelligence Report builds a print-ready Montana Unit 690 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 690
Unit 690 lies in Hill, Blaine and Chouteau counties and covers about 4,359 square miles. Ground runs from 2,689 to 4,770 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 690
Montana FWP's material on unit 690 stops at the boundary — there is no agency account of where its elk live. The country below is verified; where to begin in it is our judgement, not the agency's. The unit lies in Hill, Blaine and Chouteau counties. It runs to about 4,359 square miles.
The lines of the unit: Marias River, Missouri River and Cow Creek
Montana FWP draws unit 690 in Hill, Blaine and Chouteau counties with a boundary that runs on US Highway 2, and on Marias River, Missouri River, Cow Creek and Suction Creek, walked corner by corner in its hunting district legal descriptions. 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: Baldy Mountain, Wellen Peak and Little Joe Peak
Named high points inside the unit include Baldy Mountain at 6,901 feet, Wellen Peak at 6,366 feet, Little Joe Peak at 6,317 feet, Pecora Ridge at 6,238 feet and Black Mountain at 6,181 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: McDonald Basin, Wilson Desert and Blackie Coulee
Below them sit McDonald Basin at 4,276 feet, Wilson Desert at 4,200 feet, Blackie Coulee at 4,157 feet, Salt Coulee at 4,126 feet and Broughs Coulee at 4,096 feet. These are the folds worth watching, and the ones other hunters walk past on the way to somewhere steeper. Pick the one with the least road on its upwind side.
Water in this unit
The water inside the unit line comes to 204 mapped stream reaches, 106 lakes and 1,082 stock tanks. 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 Private / Other 77%, 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. The unit runs from 2,689 feet to 4,770 feet, averaging 3,313 — enough relief to separate summer range from winter range.
Unit 690 terrain and land status
Measured from the unit boundary, not from the agency write-up
The lay of it
- 2,689–4,770 ft on a terrain sample , averaging 3,313 ft ; peaks can run higher.
- 4,358.9 sq mi inside the boundary. Big enough that picking one drainage beats driving three.
Who owns the ground
- BLM — 15%
- State Trust — 8%
- Private / Other — 77%
Roughly 23% is public. Carry a land-status layer anyway — these are area percentages, not a map of where the boundaries fall.
Water on the ground
- 1,082 tanks
- 204 stream segments
- 106 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: Wellen Peak (6,366 ft), Myrtle Butte (5,253 ft), Hansen Butte (5,134 ft), Miles Butte (4,942 ft)
Holding ground: Spring Coulee (2,924 ft), Flat Coulee (2,851 ft), Fourteenmile Coulee (2,767 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 690
Elk Success Rates
Montana FWP's 2023 harvest estimates carry no elk row for unit 690 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 690. 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
Planning Notes
Camp Sites
16 developed campgrounds in or beside the unit, including Eagle Creek Campground (Float-In), Dark Butte (Float-In) and Little Sandy Coulee Recreation Site.
Road Conditions
US 2, Cow Island Trail and S-448 are the named routes in the unit. Roughly 123 mi paved, 280 mi gravel and 9 mi four-wheel-drive.
Terrain Difficulty
2,689–4,770 ft, averaging 3,313. Enough relief to separate summer from winter range.
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 73/43°F, 1.1 in.; Oct 58/32°F, 0.9 in.; Nov 43/21°F, 0.6 in..
Cell Service
Verizon 26%, AT&T 17%, T-Mobile 9% of the unit area — modelled coverage, not measured. Assume no signal off the paved road.
Nearest Town
Rocky Boy's Agency (6 mi), Big Sandy (17 mi), West Havre (25 mi)
Frequently Asked Questions
Where is Colorado unit 690?
What is the elk success rate in unit 690?
Where do you stay and resupply for a unit 690 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 2026-10-24.
- 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