CO Unit 55 4th Rifle Season

[artyman1775]

Gonna try to hit GMU 55 in CO this November in 4th rifle season. I'm a non-resident rookie elk hunter but we go all DIY and we'll head back several miles from roads. This will be our second try for elk. From what I understand, in 4th rifle season, best bet is to look for winter ranges on the CO hunting atlas and look at lower altitudes if the weather gets tough and maybe a little higher if the snow hasn't hit hard yet. Looks like a good bit of the winter range is BLM land. Any information on hunting BLM land? Can we use ATV's? Any other info? If anybody has any tips on hunting 55 PM me. Thanks.

 

[elkduds]

ATVs are legal on atv-designated trails/roads only on BLM and USFS. In 55 you will have plenty of atv company, the unit is known for that.

 

[Thomas11]

It is the AtV capital of the world! It's unbelievable. Are other units just bad as far as ATV traffic?

 

[artyman1775]

TopRut shows about a 54% success rate for 4th rifle season in GMU 55. Very little private land in the unit so I'm assuming most of that success is down where the Colorado Hunting Atlas shows the winter range. All those ATV's don't scatter the elk out of the area?

 

[Thomas11]

The Atv traffic I think is more tourist/scenic so it's more in the high country early season. I'd say 75% is non hunters. But I'm not sure on the late hunt, id assume that time of yr it would be only hunters u see on atv traffic wise

 

[artyman1775]

I'm from Mississippi so I'm not used to the winter in Colorado. What kind of snow conditions can I expect in mid-November in unit 55? Figure it's pretty deep in snow on the more mountainous portions of the Wilderness area in the middle of 55. How deep does the snow get in the drainages and down in the southern part where the elevation is a little bit lower?

 

[ColoradoV]

Atv trails and more importantly dirt bike or mountain bike single track is pretty much everywhere in 55. The most side by sides you will ever see is either Labor day weekend or the weekend before centered out of Taylor Lake. All polaris razors super fun ride and good folks and after participating I was amazed at how many folks there are with razors these days. Yea there will be many groups with 20+ side by sides in each one on every single trail in that general area for 3 full days. So many dust rivers form from all the razors.

Most years all but the maintained passes in the area are closed by Halloween if not before. So snow pack levels will dictate where you will have access to during most 4th season hunts.