Ochoco Unit 37: Archery Elk - 2020

[hibernation]

100% about too many roads in Oregon. Not saying everything should be pure wilderness backpacking only, but so many places I go have a road on the ridge, a road in the valley, and a road or two on the slope somewhere. I wouldn't mind at all if we decommissioned or gated more spur roads.

I've never hunted the Ochoco unit for archery, but a quick look at the harvest stats shows it with worse success rates than most OTC units. Not sure how many points it takes these days, but for a draw unit I'd really want better than 11% success rate.

 

[JasonWi]

I haven't hunted the Ochoco unit but have hunted Ukiah/Starkey quite a bit during archery and the road/atv trail access is insane! You spend just as much time trying to get away from other people as trying to find elk.
I wouldn't recommend either unit, in fact this year was the worst I've ever seen for the amount of people. I'm sure a lot of that can be attributed to the fires on the western side of the state, but it was easily double what I've ever seen before.

 

[Baddog]

Forgot to mention the wild horses. Can’t even count the number of wild horses I saw in the Ochocos. Obviously not the point of the hunt. But, I always enjoyed running into them.

Feral horses not wild. Should be taken off the landscape...

 

[ManyBullets]

Hunted it and saw elk. Lots of road hunters in there and a ton of roads. Would be pretty cool if they just closed off a ton of the roads during hunting season and made people walk.

Anyway if you get off the roads and hunt you can find elk in that unit like most units in Oregon but there are a lot of tags issued. Overall, success rates are low in Oregon.