Unit research · Colorado · GMU 8

GMU 8 — Colorado

77% public hunting land across 269,125 ac. Road access is easy — only 3% of the public land is more than a mile from a road. Almost none of the public land is landlocked.

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Pronghorn draw odds (4)Odds and pins: free, no account

GMU 8Full map — ownership, roads, wind →

6,990–10,960 ft

elevation range

77%

public hunting land

of public >1 mi from a road

693 ac

landlocked public

3.47

road miles per mi²

298 mi

trails on public land

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

Tags & season

Draw hunts on this ground.

4 limited-entry pronghorn hunts are drawn on GMU 8: apply in the Colorado draw, by the agency's deadline below.

Pronghorn tag · 4 draw hunts (2026)$60.18 resident · $518.41 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 pronghorn →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

■ Forest Service 67%■ BLM 6%■ State wildlife 4%▨ Parks & other public 1%□ Private 23%

Unit area269,125 ac

Public hunting land206,221 ac (77%)

Parks & other public1,596 ac · Private conservation, State trust

Landlocked public693 ac (0.3%)

Pronghorn draw pressure0.12 tags/mi² public (0.090 of total area)

Motorized routes (MVUM + roads)1,461 mi

Mapped trails on public land298 mi

Backcountry

Public land >1 mi from a road6,800 ac (3% of public)

Road density3.47 mi/mi²

Managed byForest Service 179k ac · BLM 17k ac · State wildlife 10k ac

Elevation6,990–10,960 ft

Median elevation8,800 ft

Median slope8°

Where the ground sits

6,990 ft10,960 ft

Tap or hover the bars for each elevation band

Slope mix

Which way the slopes face

N 28%

E 25%

S 25%

W 22%

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

35,819 ac of this gmu has burned — 13% 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 LARAMIE REGIONAL AIRPORT, 51 km from the unit’s center and ~1,500 ft below its median elevation — expect the unit to run colder. NOAA ISD-Lite hourly observations.

Harvest — agency survey estimates

Elk · 2024

9% success

208 taken by 2,219 hunters · 10,883 days afield

125 bulls · 79 cows · 4 calves

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

Season breakdown · 2024

Season	Success	Harvest	Hunters
1st rifle	8%	9	124
2nd rifle	4%	18	406
3rd rifle	12%	52	431
4th rifle	7%	22	310
Archery	7%	33	456
Muzzleloader	8%	26	340

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

Deer · 2024

18% success

241 taken by 1,335 hunters · 6,720 days afield

124 bucks · 108 does · 9 fawns

Deer hunter success · 2019–2024 · 18% → 18%

Season breakdown · 2024

Season	Success	Harvest	Hunters
Archery	22%	88	404
Muzzleloader	11%	33	314

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

Pronghorn · 2024

36% success

34 taken by 96 hunters · 325 days afield

23 bucks · 11 does · 0 fawns

Pronghorn hunter success · 2019–2024 · 23% → 36%

Season breakdown · 2024

Season	Success	Harvest	Hunters
Archery	11%	5	51
Muzzleloader	34%	3	8

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

Herd-level estimates · 95% CI

deer · DAU D-4 · 2025: 1,419 harvested (CI 1,294–1,556) · 29% success

elk · DAU E-4 · 2025: 645 harvested (CI 574–725) · 11% success

pronghorn · DAU A-36 · 2025: 75 harvested (CI 65–87) · 29% 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 786% public · 42% remote GMU 19147% public · 17% remote GMU 1962% public · 31% remote GMU 640% public · 2% remote GMU 17163% public · 5% remote GMU 90% public · 0% remote

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