Unit 008 (Boulder Ridge)
Wyoming Hunting Guide — Elk
Elk Hunt Area 8, which Wyoming Game and Fish names Boulder Ridge, covers about 377 square miles in Albany County. It belongs to WGFD's Snowy Range elk herd unit. WGFD's 2025 harvest survey put elk success here at 50.1%, with 377 hunters taking 189 elk at about 17.2 days of hunting per animal. Federal land covers about 10% of it. Check land status on a current map before you plan a route.
Build your own PDF hunt guide for Unit 008
Answer a few questions about your tag, your season and your rig, and the Field Intelligence Report builds a print-ready Wyoming Unit 008 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 008
Elk Hunt Area 8, which Wyoming Game and Fish names Boulder Ridge, covers about 377 square miles in Albany County. It belongs to WGFD's Snowy Range elk herd unit. WGFD's 2025 harvest survey put elk success here at 50.1%, with 377 hunters taking 189 elk at about 17.2 days of hunting per animal. Federal land covers about 10% of it. Check land status on a current map before you plan a route.
Where to Find Elk in Elk Hunt Area 8
The Wyoming Game and Fish Commission names elk hunt area 8 "Boulder Ridge". It runs to about 377 square miles, entirely in Albany County. WGFD reports these elk as the Snowy Range herd unit, which also takes in elk hunt areas 9, 10, 11, 12, 110 and 125. WGFD prints the line and counts the harvest. It doesn't say where inside the line the elk live, so that part is our read of the ground, labelled as such.
Where elk hunt area 8 begins and ends
WGFD's 2026 Chapter 7 walks the line around elk hunt area 8 corner by corner. It starts at the city of Laramie and U.S. Highway 287. On the way round it follows U.S. Highway 287, Wyoming Highway 10 and Wyoming Highway 230. Read it as the legal edge of your license rather than as a hint about animals. The full text is in Section 9 of that chapter, with this year's season dates and license limitations in Section 2.
Not the same ground as the other hunt area 8s
WGFD numbers each species' hunt areas on its own grid, so the number 8 also belongs to its deer, antelope, moose and bighorn sheep hunt areas 8. None of them shares a county with this one. A license is good only in the hunt area of its own species, so this page is about the elk area, and the cards at the foot of the page link the others.
Ground WGFD opens: Jelm and Cherokee Park
WGFD administers the Jelm Wildlife Habitat Management Area (636 acres) inside or across the line. Its Access Yes program enrolls 2 Hunter Management Areas here that list elk among their species — Cherokee Park (3,611 acres) and Lewis Ranch (11,570 acres). WGFD's 2026 regulations open Access Yes land only for the species and dates listed for each area, with each area's own rules on WGFD's site and no motorized travel unless WGFD says otherwise.
High ground inside the line: Jelm Mountain, Ring Mountain and Fish Creek Rock
Named high points inside elk hunt area 8 include Jelm Mountain at 9,656 feet, Ring Mountain at 8,801 feet, Fish Creek Rock at 7,721 feet, Steamboat Rock at 7,637 feet and Twelvemile Hill at 7,254 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: Sunrise Pass, Pollock Draw and Cathy Draw
Below them sit Sunrise Pass at 8,172 feet, Pollock Draw at 8,008 feet, Cathy Draw at 7,850 feet and Dirty Woman Draw at 7,570 feet. That is the low ground — where animals drop when they are pushed or when the weather turns.
Unit 008 terrain and land status
Measured from the unit boundary, not from the agency write-up · figures are for GMU 8
The lay of it
- 7,183–8,506 ft on a terrain sample , averaging 7,496 ft ; peaks can run higher.
- 376.1 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
- 84 tanks
- 4 springs
- 44 stream segments
- 28 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: Jelm Mountain (9,656 ft), Ring Mountain (8,801 ft)
Holding ground: Pollock Draw (8,008 ft), Lewis Ranch Hunter Management Area, Cherokee Park Hunter Management Area
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 Elk Hunt Area 8
Elk Success Rates
Wyoming Game and Fish's 2025 harvest report estimates 50.1% elk success in elk hunt area 8: 189 animals taken by 377 active hunters over 3,249 days of hunting, or 17.2 days per animal. By residency, residents 50.2% (149 taken by 297) and nonresidents 50% (40 taken by 80).
These are WGFD's own estimates from its hunter survey, for this hunt area and season only — not a statewide average. One season isn't a trend, so check the current report before you read one into it.
Elk Draw Odds
| Season | Tags | Applicants | Draw % | Pts (n/p) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rifle — General Type 1 either sex (resident) | 115 | 116 | 99.1% | — |
| Rifle — General Type 1 either sex (nonresident) | 3 | 23 | 13.0% | — |
Data from 2026 draw results. Each row is one residency pool — read the label before the number. This agency publishes no point thresholds, so the Pts column stays blank and these are pool odds, not what a point total draws.
Open in Draw Odds EngineWyoming Game and Fish's 2026 demand report for elk in elk hunt area 8, residents and nonresidents kept apart because they draw from different license pools:
- Type 1 (any elk), residents: 116 first-choice applicants for 115 licenses, 99.1% drawn
- Type 1 (any elk), nonresidents: 23 first-choice applicants for 3 licenses, 13% drawn
Wyoming residents draw elk licenses without preference points; nonresidents draw part of their quota on points, highest balance first (Chapter 44, Section 19), and the nonresident figures above are from WGFD's random draw. WGFD publishes no preference-point level at which a hunt draws, so none is given here. Every figure was checked against WGFD's demand-report PDFs on 2026-08-10.
Unit Logistics & Expectations
Frequently Asked Questions
Where is Wyoming elk hunt area 8?
What is the elk success rate in elk hunt area 8?
Is elk hunt area 8 the same ground as deer hunt area 8?
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 2026-10-25.
- Chapter 7 — Elk Hunting Seasons (2026) — Wyoming Game and Fish Commission · supports: Name and legal boundary of elk hunt area 8, Season dates, license types and limitations by hunt area · accessed 2026-10-25
- Elk 2025 Harvest Report — Wyoming Game and Fish Department · supports: Hunters, harvest, percent success and days per animal for elk in elk hunt area 8, The same by license type and residency · accessed 2026-10-25
- WGFD draw results and odds — demand reports 2021-2026 — Wyoming Game and Fish Department · supports: First-choice applicants, licenses and percent drawn, by license type, residency and year · accessed 2026-08-10
- Chapter 44 — Regulation for Issuance of Licenses, Permits, Stamps, Tags, Preference Points and Competitive Raffle Chances — Wyoming Game and Fish Commission · supports: Which licenses are drawn on preference points (Section 19), When preference points are deleted · accessed 2026-10-25
- 2026 Antelope, Deer and Elk Hunting Regulations — Wyoming Game and Fish Commission · supports: Access Yes Walk-In and Hunter Management Area rules · accessed 2026-10-25
- WGFD ArcGIS feature services — hunt areas by species, CWD sampling areas, WHMAs, Public Access Areas, Hunter Management Areas, Walk-In Hunting Areas — Wyoming Game and Fish Department · supports: Mapped outline of the hunt area, Herd unit and square miles, WHMAs, Public Access Areas, Hunter Management Areas and Walk-In Areas inside the area · accessed 2026-10-25
- TIGERweb State_County — Wyoming county boundaries (used only to measure which counties a hunt area lies in) — U.S. Census Bureau · supports: Which counties the hunt area lies in, and in what share · accessed 2026-10-25