Your first Colorado hunt, start to finish
A free course in eight steps, from "can I hunt this year" to carrying the meat out. Every lesson is built on the printed rules, measured ground or published research, with its sources listed, and every tool works on your own unit and dates.
1 Can you hunt Colorado this year?
What you need before you can buy any license, and what it costs.
- Colorado Hunter Education Requirements 2026Do you need hunter safety to hunt in Colorado? Who needs a card, which cards Colorado accepts, and the test-out and apprentice options for 2026.
- Colorado Nonresident Elk License Cost 2026A nonresident Colorado elk license is $845.16 in 2026. See every required add-on, deer prices, resident prices, and the draw and OTC totals.
- First Colorado Elk Hunt for Nonresidents, 2026Planning a first do-it-yourself Colorado elk hunt from out of state in 2026. Licenses, rifle season dates, what to buy first, and a timeline.
2 Get a tag
Which licenses you can still buy without a draw, and what each one lets you hunt.
- Can Nonresidents Buy OTC Elk Tags in Colorado? 2026Yes for 2nd and 3rd rifle bull and plains elk. No for archery west of I-25. The 2026 over-the-counter elk licenses a nonresident can buy.
- Colorado OTC Elk Units 2026: 2nd and 3rd RifleEvery Colorado OTC bull elk unit for 2nd and 3rd rifle 2026, from the CPW brochure: what changed, who can buy, prices and rules.
- Colorado 2nd Rifle Elk Season 2026Colorado's 2nd rifle season in 2026 runs Oct. 24 to Nov. 1. OTC bull elk units, prices, antler, orange and CWD rules, plus an exact hunt plan.
- Colorado 3rd Rifle Elk Season 2026Colorado's 3rd rifle season in 2026 runs Nov. 7 to 15. OTC bull units, prices, antler rules, orange and CWD rules, plus an exact hunt plan for your tag.
- Every elk unit, with its hunt codesOpen your unit to see the licenses valid in it and what each code means.
3 Choose a unit
Room to hunt, a way in, and success figures you can read without fooling yourself.
- How to Choose a Colorado Elk Unit for a First HuntA plain way for a first-time hunter to narrow Colorado's elk units by license type, public land, crowding, past harvest and drive time.
- How to Read Colorado Unit Harvest TablesCompare hunters, harvest and season rows without confusing a whole-unit success rate with your chances on public land.
- Public land by unitEvery unit ranked by national forest and BLM share, with the over-the-counter elk units marked.
4 Know the ground you may stand on
Public land is several kinds of land, each with its own rules. This is where first hunts go wrong.
- Colorado Public Land Types: Where You Can HuntNational forest, BLM, State Wildlife Areas and State Trust Land each have different hunting rules in Colorado. What each one is and what to check first.
- How to Read a Motor Vehicle Use Map (MVUM)The Motor Vehicle Use Map decides which national forest roads your truck or ATV may use, and when. How hunters read one, and the mistakes that get tickets.
- CPW property rulesWhat may be hunted, who may enter and when, on all 721 State Wildlife Areas and State Trust Lands.
5 Go where the animals go and the hunters do not
What tracking collars and GPS units on hunters have measured.
- How Far Do Hunters Really Walk?GPS tracking shows most hunters stay within a few hundred yards of a road and overstate their range. Here is what the studies measured.
- How Far From the Road Do Elk Go in Rifle Season?GPS-collar studies put hunted elk about a mile or more from motorized routes, with cover mattering less than distance. Here are the numbers.
- Do Mule Deer Bucks Leave When Rifle Season Starts?One Wyoming GPS study found bucks move away from motorized routes in rifle season but do not migrate early. Cold and snow start migration.
- Does the Moon Affect Deer and Elk Movement?GPS-collar studies on whitetails found little or no moon effect. Dawn, dusk and the rut move deer far more. No collar study has tested elk.
- When Do Pronghorn Come to Water?Camera data from New Mexico show pronghorn drink at midday, mostly in hot dry spells. Rifle pressure on pronghorn is short. Here is the evidence.
- What Actually Predicts Whether a Hunter Fills a Tag?Studies that tracked real hunters point to scouting, hours afield and knowing the ground. ATVs, age and gender did not matter.
6 Plan the day
Work back from legal light, and know what a shot costs before you take it.
- Opening Morning Elk Hunt Timeline: When to Leave CampWork back from legal shooting light to the minute you leave camp. A worked timeline for a Colorado rifle elk opener, with the numbers behind each step.
- Legal shooting hoursLegal light for your unit and your dates, to the minute.
- Pack-out calculatorLoads, miles and hours to carry an elk or deer from a seat back to the truck.
- How to Pack Out an Elk: Loads, Miles and Meat CareA bull elk is about 200 pounds of boned meat and three or four loads. What a university study measured, Colorado's meat rules, and how to plan the carry.
7 Get there in one piece
The mountains stop more first hunts than the elk do.
- Altitude Sickness on a Colorado Elk HuntOne in four visitors sleeping above 8,000 feet in Colorado gets altitude sickness, and fitness does not protect you. How to plan an elk camp around it.
- First-Time Elk Hunter Rules Checklist, ColoradoA checklist of Colorado rifle elk rules first-timers get wrong. Orange, legal hours, rifle minimums, antler points, carcass tag and CWD testing.
8 Or have it worked out for you
What a plan is, what one costs, and when a plan cannot be built.
- Colorado Elk E-Scouting Service: From $39.99A Colorado elk and deer e-scouting service for any unit. One finished plan for your tag, checked against public land and road rules, from $39.
- How Much Does an E-Scouting Service Cost in 2026?E-scouting for an elk or deer hunt costs $39.99 to $1,600 in 2026, depending on who does it and how. Here is what each price gets you.
- Why a Hunt Plan Can Return No AreasDownloaded map data does not promise a usable hunt plan. Here is what an empty result means and what to check before changing your request.
- A real planParking, camp, seats, routes and leave times for one tag, exactly as a hunter receives it.
How this is different
- It is about your hunt. The tools take your unit and your dates. The reference pages cover every Colorado unit, every hunt code and every CPW property by name.
- It shows its sources. Rules come from the 2026 Colorado Parks and Wildlife brochures and regulations. Behaviour comes from collar and GPS studies, cited in each guide, with what the study did not show.
- It says what it does not know. Nothing here tells you where an animal will be. It tells you what is legal, what is measured, and what the research supports.
Have a tag for this fall?
FilledTag does all eight steps for one tag: where to park, camp and sit, the routes between them and the minute to leave camp, with every pin checked against public land and road rules.