Units / Wyoming / Elk area 120

Same number, different ground: Deer area 120 →

Unit research · Wyoming Elk area 120

Buffalo Creek — Wyoming

66% public across 929,685 ac. Road access is easy — only 6% 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 (4)Odds and pins: free, no account

Elk area 120Full map — ownership, roads, wind →

4,790–9,100 ft

elevation range

66%

public land

of public >1 mi from a road

3,400 ac

landlocked public

1.37

road miles per mi²

3 mi

maintained trails

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

Tags & season

Draw hunts on this ground.

4 limited-entry elk hunts are drawn on Elk area 120: apply in the Wyoming draw, by the agency's deadline below.

Elk tag · 4 draw hunts (2026)$62.00 resident · $707.00 nonresident

Season dates: see Wyoming Game and Fish Department's regulations

2026 WGFD Hunting License Application Information (booklet PDF) ↗

Wyoming elk draw calendar

Nov 2, 2026 — point window closes — purchased-only, miss it and the year is gone

WGFD license fee list ↗Draw odds for Wyoming elk →How the Wyoming draw works →

Fees and draw dates from Wyoming Game and Fish Department, 2026, verified 2026-08-05 — past its verify-by date, confirm with the agency. Tag type from the agency's published draw statistics: a elk area that appears in none of them has no limited-entry hunt we know of. Source: 2026 WGFD Hunting License Application Information (booklet PDF) · WGFD license fee list · WGFD preference points · WGFD application dates & deadlines.

Land & access

■ BLM 48%■ SLB 13%■ USBR 5%□ Private 34%

Unit area929,685 ac

Public land612,716 ac (66%)

Landlocked public3,400 ac (0.6%)

Elk draw pressure0.27 tags/mi² public (0.17 of total area)

Walk-in access62,582 ac

Motorized routes (MVUM + roads)1,990 mi

Maintained trails3 mi

Backcountry

Public land >1 mi from a road34,624 ac (6% of public)

Road density1.37 mi/mi²

Managed byBLM 446k ac · SLB 120k ac · USBR 47k ac

Elevation4,790–9,100 ft

Median elevation5,620 ft

Median slope3°

Where the ground sits

4,790 ft9,100 ft

Tap or hover the bars for each elevation band

Slope mix

Which way the slopes face

N 25%

E 25%

S 30%

W 20%

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

14,248 ac of this elk area 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 NATRONA COUNTY INTERNATIONAL AP, 43 km from the unit’s center. NOAA ISD-Lite hourly observations.

Harvest — agency survey estimates

Elk · 2025

55.8% success

192 taken by 344 hunters · 3,568 days afield

104 bulls · 6 spikes · 74 cows · 8 calves

Res 58% · NR 47% success

Elk hunter success · 2021–2025 · 58% → 56%

WGFD estimates harvest statistics from a voluntary hunter survey run with the University of Wyoming Survey & Analysis Center. "Hunters" are active hunters (license holders who actually hunted). Hunt areas are species-specific geographies. Source: WGFD Annual Harvest Reports (per species-year PDFs) · WGFD Job Completion Reports (per herd unit: population, harvest, success).

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, file an issue — the fix ships for everyone.

Nearby elk areas

Middle Fork · Elk area 3353% public · 4% remote Rattlesnake · Elk area 2353% public · 3% remote Pine Ridge · Elk area 12226% public · 5% remote Upper Nowood · Elk area 4858% public · 3% remote Muddy Mountain · Elk area 1946% public · 1% remote Muskrat · Elk area 12880% public · 3% remote

Ready to scout it?

Everything on this page, live on the map — ownership, boundaries, roads, and your own waypoints.

Open Elk area 120 in the map

What happens nextNov 2 — Elk point window closes — purchased-only, miss it and the year is gone · details →