New Mexico · Bighorn Sheep · any legal big-game sporting arm
New Mexico bighorn sheep hunt BHS-1-204
Units 13, 17, 19, 20, 26, 27 (TBD by hunt area selected). Bag limit ram (RAM). Of the people who ranked this hunt first, how many drew it — year by year, and separately for each of the three pools New Mexico draws. Every figure comes from a Department of Wildlife report linked at the foot of this page.
What the 2026 draw did
New Mexico offered 24 licences on hunt code BHS-1-204 in 2026 and issued 24 — the hunt filled. Among the three pools the state draws separately, 973 nonresident applicants ranked it first and 1 drew it, 0.10%; 2,624 resident applicants ranked it first and 14 drew it, 0.53%; 1,118 guided (outfitter) applicants ranked it first and none of them drew it.
First-choice draw rate, by pool and year
| Year | Pool | Ranked it first | Drew on first choice | First-choice draw rate | Ranked it 2nd or 3rd | Licences to this pool | Share of the quota |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | Resident | 2,624 | 14 | 0.53% | 5,161 | 21 | 87.5% |
| 2026 | Nonresident | 973 | 1 | 0.10% | 1,569 | 1 | 4.17% |
| 2026 | Guided (outfitter) | 1,118 | 0 | 0.00% | 2,476 | 2 | 8.33% |
| 2025 | Resident | 2,745 | 14 | 0.51% | 4,699 | 21 | 84% |
| 2025 | Nonresident | 1,032 | 2 | 0.19% | 1,518 | 2 | 8% |
| 2025 | Guided (outfitter) | 1,042 | 2 | 0.19% | 2,337 | 2 | 8% |
| 2024 | Resident | 2,598 | 12 | 0.46% | 4,145 | 21 | 87.5% |
| 2024 | Nonresident | 1,183 | 0 | 0.00% | 1,275 | 1 | 4.17% |
| 2024 | Guided (outfitter) | 1,118 | 0 | 0.00% | 1,881 | 2 | 8.33% |
| 2023 | Resident | 2,817 | 18 | 0.64% | 3,845 | 24 | 85.71% |
| 2023 | Nonresident | 1,068 | 1 | 0.09% | 1,151 | 1 | 3.58% |
| 2023 | Guided (outfitter) | 1,424 | 3 | 0.21% | 1,341 | 3 | 10.71% |
| 2022 | Resident | 2,590 | 13 | 0.50% | 3,538 | 21 | 87.5% |
| 2022 | Nonresident | 1,061 | 0 | 0.00% | 787 | 1 | 4.17% |
| 2022 | Guided (outfitter) | 1,497 | 2 | 0.13% | 1,273 | 2 | 8.33% |
| 2021 | Resident | 2,754 | 17 | 0.62% | 3,388 | 21 | 87.5% |
| 2021 | Nonresident | 1,156 | 1 | 0.09% | 866 | 1 | 4.17% |
| 2021 | Guided (outfitter) | 1,558 | 2 | 0.13% | 1,001 | 2 | 8.33% |
| 2020 | Resident | 2,202 | 15 | 0.68% | 2,551 | 21 | 84% |
| 2020 | Nonresident | 1,015 | 1 | 0.10% | 638 | 1 | 4% |
| 2020 | Guided (outfitter) | 1,204 | 3 | 0.25% | 759 | 3 | 12% |
| 2019 | Resident | 2,189 | 17 | 0.78% | 2,358 | 21 | — |
| 2019 | Nonresident | 1,062 | 2 | 0.19% | 584 | 2 | — |
| 2019 | Guided (outfitter) | 1,241 | 2 | 0.16% | 549 | 2 | — |
Share of the quota is the department's own R% / NR% / O% column: this pool's share of the licences offered. It is an allocation split set by state law — a minimum of 84% resident, 10% outfitted, 6% nonresident — and not a chance of drawing. It reads 100% on any hunt residents took in full. It is shown because the department publishes it and a reader will meet it elsewhere, not because it answers the question this page is about.
The first-choice draw rate, year by year
One strip per pool, because the three are drawn separately under different shares and a single averaged line would hide the only distinction most readers are here for. Each figure is a record of what that year's draw did. None of it forecasts the next one.
Rounded to whole percentages here; the table above carries them to two decimals. A dash means nobody in that pool ranked this hunt first that year.
Licences offered against licences issued
These are different numbers and the department publishes both. A hunt can fail to fill, and 35 of the 893 hunts in the 2026 report did.
| Year | Licences offered | Licences issued | Applicants who ranked it first | Applicants in total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | 24 | 24 | 4,715 | 13,921 |
| 2025 | 25 | 25 | 4,819 | 13,373 |
| 2024 ⚠ | 24 | 24 | 4,899 | 12,200 |
| 2023 | 28 | 28 | 5,309 | 11,646 |
| 2022 | 24 | 24 | 5,148 | 10,746 |
| 2021 | 24 | 24 | 5,468 | 10,723 |
| 2020 | 25 | 25 | 4,421 | 8,369 |
| 2019 | 25 | 25 | 4,492 | 7,983 |
Applicants in total counts everyone who ranked this hunt anywhere in their three choices, across all three pools. It is a measure of demand, not of competition for a first-choice licence.
⚠ marks a year where two figures the department published disagree with each other: one cell in the winners table is not a number and is shown as unpublished. The rows are shown exactly as the department published them and nothing is corrected here, because correcting them would mean inventing a figure it never stated.
Sources for this hunt
- 2026CompleteReport.xlsx — New Mexico Department of Wildlife, published 2026-04-13, fetched 2026-08-31
- 2025CompleteReport.xlsx — New Mexico Department of Wildlife, published 2025-04-09, fetched 2026-08-31
- 2024CompleteReport.xlsx — New Mexico Department of Wildlife, published 2024-04-09, fetched 2026-08-31
- 2023-odds_corrected_CN.xlsx — New Mexico Department of Wildlife, published 2023-04-11, fetched 2026-08-31
- 2022-Complete-Report.xlsx — New Mexico Department of Wildlife, published 2022-04-12, fetched 2026-08-31
- 2021-Big-Game-Drawing-Odds-Complete-Report.xlsx — New Mexico Department of Wildlife, published 2021-04-14, fetched 2026-08-31
- 2020-Drawing-Odds-Complete-Report.xlsx — New Mexico Department of Wildlife, published 2020-08-03, fetched 2026-08-31
- 2019-Drawing-Odds-Complete-Report.xlsx — New Mexico Department of Wildlife, published 2019-06-26, fetched 2026-08-31