Utah Mule Deer Elk Black Bear

Unit 27 (Paunsaugunt)

Utah Hunting Guide — Mule Deer, Elk, Black Bear

Unit 27 lies in Garfield and Kane counties and covers about 1,495 square miles. Ground runs from 5,463 to 8,677 feet. UDWR publishes no per-unit mule deer success figure we can verify for this unit. Most of the unit is private, so access comes before tactics. Check land status on a current map before you plan a route.

View Draw Odds Utah Hunting Guide

⛰️

5,463–8,677 ft

Sampled elevation

Build your own PDF hunt guide for Unit 27

Answer a few questions about your tag, your season and your rig, and the Field Intelligence Report builds a print-ready Utah Unit 27 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.

Mule Deer guide Elk guide Black Bear guide

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Mule Deer Hunting in Unit 27

Where to Find Mule Deer in Unit 27

UDWR draws an exact line around unit 27 and says nothing about where the mule deer stand inside it. The country below is verified; where to begin in it is our judgement, not the agency's. The unit lies in Garfield and Kane counties. It runs to about 1,495 square miles.

What bounds unit 27

UDWR has unit 27 Boundary begins at US-89A and the Utah-Arizona state line; north on US-89A to US-89; north on US-89 to SR-12; east on SR-12 to the Paria River; south along the Paria River to the Utah-Arizona state line; west along this state line to US-89A. That is a legal description, not a habitat map. 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: Black Butte, Don Spring Mountain and Wilson Peak

Named high points inside the unit include Black Butte at 9,554 feet, Don Spring Mountain at 9,084 feet, Wilson Peak at 9,039 feet, George Mountain at 9,038 feet and Sunset Cliffs at 8,739 feet. Several carry a public-land flag in our data, which makes them the first places to try for a view. Mule deer on open country use every fold and draw there is, and almost none of the flat.

Holding ground: Swapp Canyon, Robinson Canyon and Cougar Hollow

Below them sit Swapp Canyon at 8,407 feet, Robinson Canyon at 8,338 feet, Cougar Hollow at 8,241 feet, Sieler Meadow at 8,237 feet and Coyote Hollow at 8,203 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: Hog Canyon Spring, Ram Spring and Fuller Spring

The water inside the unit line comes to 2,101 mapped stream reaches, 15 lakes, 339 stock tanks and 165 springs. Named sources include Hog Canyon Spring, Ram Spring, Fuller Spring, Spaniard Spring, Dry Spring and First Point 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.

Before you apply: who owns this unit

A UDWR permit does not authorise hunting on Native American trust lands, on a CWMU without that CWMU's own permit, or on National Park land, and written permission is required to hunt private land. 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. The unit runs from 5,463 feet to 8,677 feet, averaging 6,766 — enough relief to separate summer range from winter range.

Unit 27 terrain and land status

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

The lay of it

5,463–8,677 ft on a terrain sample , averaging 6,766 ft ; peaks can run higher.
1,494.8 sq mi inside the boundary. Big enough that picking one drainage beats driving three.

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

339 tanks
165 springs
2,101 stream segments
15 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: Black Butte (9,554 ft), Don Spring Mountain (9,084 ft), Wilson Peak (9,039 ft), Sunset Cliffs (8,739 ft)

Holding ground: Paunsaugunt Plateau (9,043 ft), Crawford Pass (8,520 ft), Upper Straight Canyon (8,499 ft), Hog Canyon Spring, Fuller 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 Mule Deer in Unit 27

UDWR publishes no mule deer success figure for unit 27 that we can tie to this unit alone, so we won't quote one. The plan: glass the broken edges at first light, then sit still and keep glassing the same ground.

Glassing from Twin Hills, Deer Mountain and Johnson Bench

Take a position on one of Twin Hills (7,843 ft), Deer Mountain (7,808 ft), Johnson Bench (7,794 ft) and Black Mountain (7,751 ft) and be on it before light. Work the morning with the air falling away from you, then accept that by mid-morning the wind has reversed and the plan has to change with it. A tripod is worth more here than another hour of walking. On the rut hunts, late-season hunts put bucks with doe groups and moving in daylight.

Water against feed

There are 2,101 mapped stream reaches and 339 tanks inside the unit, so water is rarely the limiting factor. Where water is everywhere, feed is what concentrates animals, so hunt the feed and treat water as a convenience. Check the ground around it before you commit an evening to it.

Timing the season: Sep, Oct, Nov

Season normals here run Sep 76/42°F, Oct 64/33°F and Nov 51/23°F. Warm afternoons compress the hunting into the first and last hour, and make meat care the day's real problem rather than the shot. Precipitation runs about 1.6 in. in Sep, 1.7 in. in Oct and 1.1 in. in Nov, and the graded gravel in this unit turns greasy wet.

Getting past the roads: US 89 and SR 12

US 89 and SR 12 are the paved frame, which is also where everyone else starts. There are roughly 18.7 miles of genuine four-wheel-drive road in the unit, and the country past the end of them is the part worth your legs.

A first plan from the pins on this page

The map above marks Black Butte, Don Spring Mountain, Wilson Peak and Sunset Cliffs as places to see from, and Paunsaugunt Plateau, Crawford Pass, Upper Straight Canyon and Hog Canyon Spring as ground to watch. Each pin is a named feature verified to fall inside the unit line, not a spot anyone has hunted. Take the pair you can reach on one road and treat the rest as a second trip.

What a day here costs you

1,495 square miles is more country than a week will cover, so pick one drainage and learn it rather than driving the unit. The nearest services are at Alton, about 15 miles out, which is an hour of your morning each way if you sleep there. With 3,214 feet between the lowest and highest ground, the walk back up out of a kill site is the part to plan first. Decide the night before where you will be at first light, and go there in the dark.

Getting in and staying out: unit 27

Named routes and what they need

US 89 — 22.7 mi · Paved (all rigs)
SR 12 — 9.8 mi · Paved (all rigs)
BLM 1 — 3.1 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
Lutherwood Road — 2.5 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
BLM 82 — 2.4 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
Kaneplex Drive — 1.6 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

Alton — 14.6 mi · no services listed
Glendale — 18 mi · lodging
Orderville — 20.4 mi · lodging
Cannonville — 21.1 mi · fuel, groceries
Henrieville — 22.9 mi · lodging

Developed camps

Daves Hollow Dispersed Camping
Mount Carmel Free Campsite · Free
Unnamed camp site
Riggs Spring Campsite
Unnamed camp site

Season weather and signal

Jan41° / 17° · 1.8" precip
Aug83° / 50° · 1.8" precip
Sep76° / 42° · 1.6" precip
Oct64° / 33° · 1.7" precip
Nov51° / 23° · 1.1" precip
Dec41° / 17° · 1.5" precip

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

Utah rules that decide your day

Summarised from UDWR 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 official sunrise to half an hour after official sunset.

Motorized retrieval

Utah requires travel on existing roads and trails; there is no general off-road retrieval allowance. Plan a pack-out from anything you can't reach from an open route.

Tagging

Notch and attach the tag to the carcass before leaving the kill site.

Leaving meat

Wasting protected wildlife is a crime.

Where you may not shoot

Occupied structures — No discharging a firearm within 600 feet of a house, dwelling or other building without permission, and no shooting from a vehicle or across a road.

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 detailed tactics for Paunsaugunt mule deer

Upgrade to Pro — $49/yr

Mule Deer Success Rates

UDWR's 2023 harvest estimates carry no mule deer row for unit 27 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. UDWR's current harvest estimates are the place to check before you apply.

Mule Deer Draw Odds

Season	Tags	Applicants	Draw %	Pts Req
Archery — Limited Entry bull/buck only (resident)	4	56	7.1%	1
Archery — Limited Entry bull/buck only (nonresident)	3	884	0.3%	25
Archery — Premium Limited Entry bull/buck only (resident)	25	760	3.3%	22
Archery — Premium Limited Entry bull/buck only (nonresident)	3	910	0.3%	22
Archery — Management bull/buck only (resident)	8	60	13.3%	16
Archery — Management bull/buck only (nonresident)	1	26	3.8%	16
Muzzleloader — Limited Entry bull/buck only (resident)	4	67	6.0%	1
Muzzleloader — Limited Entry bull/buck only (nonresident)	3	383	0.8%	21
Muzzleloader — Premium Limited Entry bull/buck only (resident)	25	517	4.8%	23
Muzzleloader — Premium Limited Entry bull/buck only (nonresident)	3	406	0.7%	23
Muzzleloader — Management bull/buck only (resident)	8	53	15.1%	18
Muzzleloader — Management bull/buck only (nonresident)	1	14	7.1%	18
Rifle — Limited Entry bull/buck only (resident)	27	136	19.9%	10
Rifle — Limited Entry bull/buck only (nonresident)	3	51	5.9%	10
Any Legal Weapon — Premium Limited Entry bull/buck only (resident)	3	570	0.5%	27
Any Legal Weapon — Premium Limited Entry bull/buck only (nonresident)	1	374	0.3%	27
Any Legal Weapon — Management bull/buck only (resident)	23	617	3.7%	19
Any Legal Weapon — Management bull/buck only (nonresident)	3	222	1.4%	19
Any Legal Weapon — Limited Entry bull/buck only (resident)	27	132	20.5%	15
Any Legal Weapon — Limited Entry bull/buck only (nonresident)	3	64	4.7%	15

Data from 2024 draw results. Each row is one residency pool — read the label before the number.

Open in Draw Odds Engine

UDWR's draw recap has no mule deer record we can tie to unit 27. 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 UDWR's own draw recap for the hunt code you mean to apply for.

Elk Hunting in Unit 27

Unit 27 lies in Garfield and Kane counties and covers about 1,495 square miles. Ground runs from 5,463 to 8,677 feet. UDWR publishes no per-unit elk success figure we can verify for this unit. 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 27

UDWR draws an exact line around unit 27 and says nothing about where the elk stand inside it. The country below is verified; where to begin in it is our judgement, not the agency's. The unit lies in Garfield and Kane counties. It runs to about 1,495 square miles.

What bounds unit 27

UDWR has unit 27 Boundary begins at US-89A and the Utah-Arizona state line; north on US-89A to US-89; north on US-89 to SR-12; east on SR-12 to the Paria River; south along the Paria River to the Utah-Arizona state line; west along this state line to US-89A. Read it as a frame, not as a hint about animals. Those features are what you will check against the map all week, and the divides among them are the ones that matter.

High ground inside the line: Buck Knoll, Whiteman Bench and The Pine Hills

Named high points inside the unit include Buck Knoll at 8,603 feet, Whiteman Bench at 8,581 feet, The Pine Hills at 7,876 feet, Twin Hills at 7,843 feet and Deer Mountain at 7,808 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: Dairy Hollow, Sand Pass and Oak Hollow

Below them sit Dairy Hollow at 8,158 feet, Sand Pass at 8,125 feet, Oak Hollow at 8,050 feet, Puma Hollow at 8,037 feet and Bridge Hollow at 7,951 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: Gravel Spring, Whiteman Spring and Adams Springs

The water inside the unit line comes to 2,101 mapped stream reaches, 15 lakes, 339 stock tanks and 165 springs. Named sources include Gravel Spring, Whiteman Spring, Adams Springs, Sand Spring, White House Spring and Lonely 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.

Before you apply: who owns this unit

Unit 27 terrain and land status

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

The lay of it

5,463–8,677 ft on a terrain sample , averaging 6,766 ft ; peaks can run higher.
1,494.8 sq mi inside the boundary. Big enough that picking one drainage beats driving three.

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

339 tanks
165 springs
2,101 stream segments
15 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: Black Butte (9,554 ft), Don Spring Mountain (9,084 ft), Wilson Peak (9,039 ft), Sunset Cliffs (8,739 ft)

Holding ground: Paunsaugunt Plateau (9,043 ft), Crawford Pass (8,520 ft), Upper Straight Canyon (8,499 ft), Hog Canyon Spring, Fuller 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 27

UDWR publishes no elk success figure for unit 27 that we can tie to this unit alone, so we won't quote one. The plan: find the feed, find the timber it backs onto, then watch the seam between them at the edges of the day.

Glassing from Horse Mountain, Deer Range and Deer Range Point

Take a position on one of Horse Mountain (7,561 ft), Deer Range (7,444 ft), Deer Range Point (7,426 ft) and Timber Mountain (7,426 ft) and be on it before light. Work the morning with the air falling away from you, then accept that by mid-morning the wind has reversed and the plan has to change with it. Glass the edges first, then the shaded timber, then the edges again as the light goes. On the rut hunts, September bugling works where you can get above a drainage and let the thermals carry sound downhill.

Water against feed

There are 2,101 mapped stream reaches and 339 tanks inside the unit, so water is rarely the limiting factor. Where water is everywhere, feed is what concentrates animals, so hunt the feed and treat water as a convenience. Sitting water works where you can see fresh tracks going in, and nowhere else.

Timing the season: Sep, Oct, Nov

Getting past the roads: US 89 and SR 12

A first plan from the pins on this page

The map above marks Black Butte, Don Spring Mountain, Wilson Peak and Sunset Cliffs as places to see from, and Paunsaugunt Plateau, Crawford Pass, Upper Straight Canyon and Hog Canyon Spring as ground to watch. Each pin is a named feature verified to fall inside the unit line, not a spot anyone has hunted. Walk between two of them rather than driving between four, and you will learn more in a day.

What a day here costs you

1,495 square miles is more country than a week will cover, so pick one drainage and learn it rather than driving the unit. The nearest services are at Alton, about 15 miles out, which is an hour of your morning each way if you sleep there. With 3,214 feet between the lowest and highest ground, the walk back up out of a kill site is the part to plan first. Leave the truck earlier than you want to and you will hunt the best half-hour of the day.

Getting in and staying out: unit 27

Named routes and what they need

US 89 — 22.7 mi · Paved (all rigs)
SR 12 — 9.8 mi · Paved (all rigs)
BLM 1 — 3.1 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
Lutherwood Road — 2.5 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
BLM 82 — 2.4 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
Kaneplex Drive — 1.6 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

Alton — 14.6 mi · no services listed
Glendale — 18 mi · lodging
Orderville — 20.4 mi · lodging
Cannonville — 21.1 mi · fuel, groceries
Henrieville — 22.9 mi · lodging

Developed camps

Daves Hollow Dispersed Camping
Mount Carmel Free Campsite · Free
Unnamed camp site
Riggs Spring Campsite
Unnamed camp site

Season weather and signal

Jan41° / 17° · 1.8" precip
Aug83° / 50° · 1.8" precip
Sep76° / 42° · 1.6" precip
Oct64° / 33° · 1.7" precip
Nov51° / 23° · 1.1" precip
Dec41° / 17° · 1.5" precip

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

Utah rules that decide your day

Summarised from UDWR 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 official sunrise to half an hour after official sunset.

Motorized retrieval

Utah requires travel on existing roads and trails; there is no general off-road retrieval allowance. Plan a pack-out from anything you can't reach from an open route.

Tagging

Notch and attach the tag to the carcass before leaving the kill site.

Leaving meat

Wasting protected wildlife is a crime.

Where you may not shoot

Occupied structures — No discharging a firearm within 600 feet of a house, dwelling or other building without permission, and no shooting from a vehicle or across a road.

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.

Pro Members Only

Unlock detailed elk tactics for the Paunsaugunt

Upgrade to Pro — $49/yr

Elk Success Rates

UDWR's 2023 harvest estimates carry no elk row for unit 27 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. UDWR's current harvest estimates are the place to check before you apply.

Elk Draw Odds

Season	Tags	Applicants	Draw %	Pts Req
Archery — Limited Entry bull/buck only (resident)	16	44	36.4%	13
Archery — Limited Entry bull/buck only (nonresident)	2	29	6.9%	13
Rifle — Limited Entry bull/buck only (resident)	3	21	14.3%	1
Rifle — Limited Entry bull/buck only (nonresident)	1	36	2.8%	4
Muzzleloader — Limited Entry bull/buck only (resident)	11	53	20.8%	10
Muzzleloader — Limited Entry bull/buck only (nonresident)	1	34	2.9%	10
Any Legal Weapon — Antlerless antlerless (resident)	15	90	16.7%	—
Any Legal Weapon — Antlerless antlerless (nonresident)	2	9	22.2%	—

Data from 2022 draw results. Each row is one residency pool — read the label before the number.

Open in Draw Odds Engine

UDWR's draw recap has no elk record we can tie to unit 27. 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 UDWR's own draw recap for the hunt code you mean to apply for.

Black Bear Hunting in Unit 27

Unit 27 lies in Garfield and Kane counties and covers about 1,495 square miles. Ground runs from 5,463 to 8,677 feet. UDWR publishes no per-unit black bear success figure we can verify for this unit. 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 Black Bear in Unit 27

UDWR draws an exact line around unit 27 and says nothing about where the black bear stand inside it. 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 Garfield and Kane counties. It runs to about 1,495 square miles.

What bounds unit 27

High ground inside the line: Johnson Bench, Black Mountain and Horse Mountain

Named high points inside the unit include Johnson Bench at 7,794 feet, Black Mountain at 7,751 feet, Horse Mountain at 7,561 feet, Deer Range at 7,444 feet and Deer Range Point at 7,426 feet. Several carry a public-land flag in our data, which makes them the first places to try for a view. Bears on dry country work the drainages with fruit in them and little else.

Holding ground: Left-hand Pole Canyon, Long Hollow and Ingram Hollow

Below them sit Left-hand Pole Canyon at 7,884 feet, Long Hollow at 7,882 feet, Ingram Hollow at 7,866 feet, Right Hand Canyon at 7,841 feet and Mill Hollow at 7,786 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: Bullberry Spring, Riggs Spring and Calf Spring

The water inside the unit line comes to 2,101 mapped stream reaches, 15 lakes, 339 stock tanks and 165 springs. Named sources include Bullberry Spring, Riggs Spring, Calf Spring, Jolly Spring, Hog Canyon Spring and Ram 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.

Before you apply: who owns this unit

Unit 27 terrain and land status

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

The lay of it

5,463–8,677 ft on a terrain sample , averaging 6,766 ft ; peaks can run higher.
1,494.8 sq mi inside the boundary. Big enough that picking one drainage beats driving three.

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

339 tanks
165 springs
2,101 stream segments
15 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: Black Butte (9,554 ft), Don Spring Mountain (9,084 ft), Wilson Peak (9,039 ft), Sunset Cliffs (8,739 ft)

Holding ground: Paunsaugunt Plateau (9,043 ft), Crawford Pass (8,520 ft), Upper Straight Canyon (8,499 ft), Hog Canyon Spring, Fuller Spring

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

Pro Members Only

Unlock where-to-find intel for Paunsaugunt black bear

Upgrade to Pro — $49/yr

How to Hunt Black Bear in Unit 27

UDWR publishes no black bear success figure for unit 27 that we can tie to this unit alone, so we won't quote one. The plan: find the berry crop first, then glass it morning and evening until something is in it.

Glassing from Deer Spring Point, No Mans Mesa and Pine Point

Take a position on one of Deer Spring Point (7,311 ft), No Mans Mesa (7,287 ft), Pine Point (7,200 ft) and Little No Mans Mesa (7,154 ft) and be on it before light. Work the morning with the air falling away from you, then accept that by mid-morning the wind has reversed and the plan has to change with it. A tripod is worth more here than another hour of walking. On the rut hunts, September hunts coincide with the feeding push before denning.

Water against feed

There are 2,101 mapped stream reaches and 339 tanks inside the unit, so water is rarely the limiting factor. Where water is everywhere, feed is what concentrates animals, so hunt the feed and treat water as a convenience. A tank with no tracks is a tank with no reason to sit on it.

Timing the season: Sep, Oct, Nov

Getting past the roads: US 89 and SR 12

A first plan from the pins on this page

The map above marks Black Butte, Don Spring Mountain, Wilson Peak and Sunset Cliffs as places to see from, and Paunsaugunt Plateau, Crawford Pass, Upper Straight Canyon and Hog Canyon Spring as ground to watch. Each pin is a named feature verified to fall inside the unit line, not a spot anyone has hunted. Walk between two of them rather than driving between four, and you will learn more in a day.

What a day here costs you

1,495 square miles is more country than a week will cover, so pick one drainage and learn it rather than driving the unit. The nearest services are at Alton, about 15 miles out, which is an hour of your morning each way if you sleep there. With 3,214 feet between the lowest and highest ground, the walk back up out of a kill site is the part to plan first. One good position held through the whole of first light beats three visited in a hurry.

Getting in and staying out: unit 27

Named routes and what they need

US 89 — 22.7 mi · Paved (all rigs)
SR 12 — 9.8 mi · Paved (all rigs)
BLM 1 — 3.1 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
Lutherwood Road — 2.5 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
BLM 82 — 2.4 mi · Graded gravel (2WD / small trailer)
Kaneplex Drive — 1.6 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

Alton — 14.6 mi · no services listed
Glendale — 18 mi · lodging
Orderville — 20.4 mi · lodging
Cannonville — 21.1 mi · fuel, groceries
Henrieville — 22.9 mi · lodging

Developed camps

Daves Hollow Dispersed Camping
Mount Carmel Free Campsite · Free
Unnamed camp site
Riggs Spring Campsite
Unnamed camp site

Season weather and signal

Jan41° / 17° · 1.8" precip
Aug83° / 50° · 1.8" precip
Sep76° / 42° · 1.6" precip
Oct64° / 33° · 1.7" precip
Nov51° / 23° · 1.1" precip
Dec41° / 17° · 1.5" precip

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

Utah rules that decide your day

Summarised from UDWR 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 official sunrise to half an hour after official sunset.

Motorized retrieval

Utah requires travel on existing roads and trails; there is no general off-road retrieval allowance. Plan a pack-out from anything you can't reach from an open route.

Tagging

Notch and attach the tag to the carcass before leaving the kill site.

Leaving meat

Wasting protected wildlife is a crime.

Where you may not shoot

Occupied structures — No discharging a firearm within 600 feet of a house, dwelling or other building without permission, and no shooting from a vehicle or across a road.

Black 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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Black Bear Success Rates

UDWR's 2023 harvest estimates carry no black bear row for unit 27 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. UDWR's current harvest estimates are the place to check before you apply.

Black Bear Draw Odds

Season	Tags	Applicants	Draw %	Pts Req
Rifle — Limited Entry either sex (resident)	3	14	21.4%	8

Data from 2024 draw results. Each row is one residency pool — read the label before the number.

Open in Draw Odds Engine

UDWR's draw recap has no black bear record we can tie to unit 27. 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 UDWR's own draw recap for the hunt code you mean to apply for.

Unit Logistics & Expectations

Planning Notes

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Camp Sites

64 developed campgrounds in or beside the unit, including Daves Hollow Dispersed Camping, Mount Carmel Free Campsite and Riggs Spring Campsite.

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Road Conditions

US 89, SR 12 and BLM 1 are the named routes in the unit. Roughly 34 mi paved, 17 mi gravel and 19 mi four-wheel-drive.

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Terrain Difficulty

5,463–8,677 ft, averaging 6,766. Enough relief to separate summer from winter range.

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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.

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Weather

Season normals: Sep 76/42°F, 1.6 in.; Oct 64/33°F, 1.7 in.; Nov 51/23°F, 1.1 in..

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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.

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Nearest Town

Alton (15 mi), Glendale (18 mi), Orderville (20 mi)

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Frequently Asked Questions

Where is Colorado unit 27?

Unit 27 lies in Garfield and Kane counties. UDWR has unit 27 Boundary begins at US-89A and the Utah-Arizona state line; north on US-89A to US-89; north on US-89 to SR-12; east on SR-12 to the Paria River; south along the Paria River to the Utah-Arizona state line; west along this state line to US-89A. It covers about 1,495 square miles.

What is the mule deer success rate in unit 27?

UDWR publishes no mule deer success figure we can tie to unit 27 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 UDWR's current harvest estimates before you apply.

Where do you stay and resupply for a unit 27 hunt?

The nearest services our logistics pipeline finds for unit 27 are at Alton, about 15 miles from the unit's centre, with Glendale at about 18 miles. There are also 64 developed campgrounds in or beside the unit.

Can you hunt unit 27 on public land?

What is the elk success rate in unit 27?

UDWR publishes no elk success figure we can tie to unit 27 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 UDWR's current harvest estimates before you apply.

What is the black bear success rate in unit 27?

UDWR publishes no black bear success figure we can tie to unit 27 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 UDWR's current harvest estimates before you apply.

Free Hunt Planning Tools

🎰 Utah Draw Odds Unit-level tag success rates 📅 Application Timeline Deadlines for all 9 states 🦌 Rut Forecast Peak rut timing by species 💰 Hunt Cost Calculator Budget your entire hunt

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Sources & Verification

Every fact on this page is tied to a primary source below. Last fact-checked 2026-10-24.

UDWR Hunt Boundaries — boundary descriptions from the Hunt Planner boundary layer — Utah Division of Wildlife Resources · supports: GMU boundary description, Counties the unit lies in, UDWR's private-land note for the unit · accessed 2026-10-24
UDWR DWR_Hunt_Boundaries_combined feature service — all 687 published hunt boundaries, including the CWMUs — Utah Division of Wildlife Resources · supports: Mapped extent of the unit, Which named ground falls inside the unit line · accessed 2026-10-24

Unit 27 (Paunsaugunt)

Build your own PDF hunt guide for Unit 27

Mule Deer Hunting in Unit 27

Where to Find Mule Deer in Unit 27

What bounds unit 27

High ground inside the line: Black Butte, Don Spring Mountain and Wilson Peak

Holding ground: Swapp Canyon, Robinson Canyon and Cougar Hollow

Water: Hog Canyon Spring, Ram Spring and Fuller Spring

Before you apply: who owns this unit

Unit 27 terrain and land status

The lay of it

Who owns the ground

Water on the ground

Named features inside the unit

How to Hunt Mule Deer in Unit 27

Mule Deer Success Rates

Mule Deer Draw Odds

Elk Hunting in Unit 27

Where to Find Elk in Unit 27

What bounds unit 27

High ground inside the line: Buck Knoll, Whiteman Bench and The Pine Hills

Holding ground: Dairy Hollow, Sand Pass and Oak Hollow

Water: Gravel Spring, Whiteman Spring and Adams Springs

Before you apply: who owns this unit

Unit 27 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 27

Elk Success Rates

Elk Draw Odds

Black Bear Hunting in Unit 27

Where to Find Black Bear in Unit 27

How to Hunt Black Bear in Unit 27

Black Bear Success Rates

Black Bear Draw Odds

Unit Logistics & Expectations

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