Unit research · Colorado · GMU 581

GMU 581 — Colorado

39% public hunting land across 440,671 ac. Road access is easy — only 13% of the public land is more than a mile from a road. Almost none of the public land is landlocked.

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Elk draw odds (1)Odds and pins: free, no account

GMU 581Full map — ownership, roads, wind →

5,300–10,860 ft

elevation range

39%

public hunting land

13%

of public >1 mi from a road

1,857 ac

landlocked public

1.89

road miles per mi²

295 mi

trails on public land

Computed from primary government data by the AGPL pipeline. See the code →

Tags & season

Draw hunts on this ground.

One limited-entry elk hunt is drawn on GMU 581: apply in the Colorado draw, by the agency's deadline below.

Elk tag · 1 draw hunt (2026)$79.33 resident · $856.65 nonresident

Plus: Qualifying license (annual small game, cheapest adult route)$38.49 resident · $104.86 nonresident

Season dates: see Colorado Parks & Wildlife's regulations

2026 Colorado Big Game brochure (rev. 2026-03-18) ↗

Colorado Parks & Wildlife — licenses and tags ↗Draw odds for Colorado elk →How the Colorado draw works →

Fees and draw dates from Colorado Parks & Wildlife, 2026, verified 2026-08-05 — past its verify-by date, confirm with the agency. Tag type from the agency's published draw statistics: a gmu that appears in none of them has no limited-entry hunt we know of. Source: 2026 Colorado Big Game brochure (rev. 2026-03-18) · CPW primary draw · CPW refunds, reversals and exchanges · Chapter W-2 (2 CCR 406-2), approved 2025-05-07.

Land & access

■ BLM 22%■ Forest Service 12%■ State wildlife 5%▨ Parks & other public 5%□ Private 56%

Unit area440,671 ac

Public hunting land173,556 ac (39%)

Parks & other public20,419 ac · State trust, National Park Service, Water district

Landlocked public1,857 ac (1.1%)

Elk draw pressure0.82 tags/mi² public (0.32 of total area)

Motorized routes (MVUM + roads)1,299 mi

Mapped trails on public land295 mi

Backcountry

Public land >1 mi from a road22,625 ac (13% of public)

Road density1.89 mi/mi²

Managed byBLM 99k ac · Forest Service 51k ac · State wildlife 24k ac

Elevation5,300–10,860 ft

Median elevation8,570 ft

Median slope9°

Where the ground sits

5,300 ft10,860 ft

Tap or hover the bars for each elevation band

Slope mix

Which way the slopes face

N 22%

E 26%

S 27%

W 26%

Share of ground steeper than 5° — flat ground has no facing

North slopes hold shade, cover and snow; south slopes open first.

USGS 3DEP 1 arc-second (30 m), slope at native resolution in a local metric projection, sampled on a 200 m grid. See the code →

Unit intelligence report · Pro, $5 a month or $49 a year

9,902 ac of this gmu has burned — 2% of the unit. The full report assembles it into one printable document and keeps it current as the facts change.

Open the report →

Season conditions — measured, not vibes

Historical temperatures · 2000–2025

Normals for 2000–2025 — tap or hover for a month

Measured at USAF ACADEMY AIRSTRIP AIRPORT, 50 km from the unit’s center and ~2,000 ft below its median elevation — expect the unit to run colder. NOAA ISD-Lite hourly observations.

Harvest — agency survey estimates

Elk · 2024

13% success

196 taken by 1,521 hunters · 11,076 days afield

115 bulls · 81 cows · 0 calves

Elk hunter success · 2019–2024 · 9% → 13%

Season breakdown · 2024

Season	Success	Harvest	Hunters
1st rifle	13%	13	99
2nd rifle	11%	41	373
3rd rifle	11%	30	272
4th rifle	13%	15	118
Archery	3%	10	352
Muzzleloader	30%	14	46

Which season is the value play here — same ground, different odds.

Deer · 2024

51% success

292 taken by 572 hunters · 2,131 days afield

249 bucks · 43 does · 0 fawns

Deer hunter success · 2019–2024 · 51% → 51%

Season breakdown · 2024

Season	Success	Harvest	Hunters
Archery	29%	28	96
Muzzleloader	29%	7	26

Which season is the value play here — same ground, different odds.

Pronghorn · 2024

49% success

18 taken by 36 hunters · 163 days afield

15 bucks · 3 does · 0 fawns

Pronghorn hunter success · 2019–2024 · 36% → 49%

Season breakdown · 2024

Season	Success	Harvest	Hunters
Archery	19%	2	9
Muzzleloader	0%	0	3

Which season is the value play here — same ground, different odds.

Herd-level estimates · 95% CI

deer · DAU D-16 · 2025: 1,048 harvested (CI 952–1,154) · 48% success

elk · DAU E-23 · 2025: 370 harvested (CI 320–427) · 10% success

pronghorn · DAU A-30 · 2025: 106 harvested (CI 98–116) · 40% success

CPW’s stratified-survey estimates for the whole herd unit (DAU) this GMU belongs to — published with the uncertainty the per-GMU tables can’t carry.

CPW estimates harvest, hunters, success and recreation days from its Big Game Harvest Survey. Unit tables run 2019-2024; the 2025 report switched to per-hunt-code tables without unit totals, so unit series end at 2024 and 2025 success rates appear on the draw-odds tables instead. Source: CPW Statewide Harvest Estimates (per species-year PDFs on the species statistics pages).

How these numbers are made

public_land_pct = public_area / unit_area
landlocked = public ∖ reachable(roads, corners)
remote = public ∖ buffer(roads, 1 mi)
# AGPL — read the pipeline →

Computed, not curated: no paid research team, no opinions dressed as data. If a number looks wrong, tell us at support@openhuntmaps.com — the fix ships for everyone.

Nearby GMUs

GMU 5847% public · 12% remote GMU 51161% public · 1% remote GMU 5933% public · 24% remote GMU 69145% public · 32% remote GMU 6935% public · 14% remote GMU 5042% public · 2% remote

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