New Mexico · Elk · any legal big-game sporting arm
New Mexico elk hunt ELK-1-178
Unit 52. Bag limit mature bull (MB). 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 2022 draw did
New Mexico offered 230 licences on hunt code ELK-1-178 in 2022 and issued 230 — the hunt filled. Among the three pools the state draws separately, 167 nonresident applicants ranked it first and 12 drew it, 7.19%; 907 resident applicants ranked it first and 127 drew it, 14.00%; 91 guided (outfitter) applicants ranked it first and 12 drew it, 13.19%.
This hunt code stops appearing after 2022. The department's 2026 report does not carry it, and this site does not map a retired code onto a current one — a renumbered hunt is not necessarily the same hunt, and the department has published nothing that says which is which. What is below is the record of the 4 years it was drawn.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | Resident | 907 | 127 | 14.00% | 1,473 | 194 | 84.35% |
| 2022 | Nonresident | 167 | 12 | 7.19% | 277 | 13 | 5.65% |
| 2022 | Guided (outfitter) | 91 | 12 | 13.19% | 203 | 23 | 10% |
| 2021 | Resident | 1,028 | 152 | 14.79% | 1,761 | 194 | 84.35% |
| 2021 | Nonresident | 145 | 8 | 5.52% | 285 | 13 | 5.65% |
| 2021 | Guided (outfitter) | 79 | 17 | 21.52% | 139 | 23 | 10% |
| 2020 | Resident | 801 | 152 | 18.98% | 1,216 | 194 | 84.35% |
| 2020 | Nonresident | 125 | 13 | 10.40% | 208 | 13 | 5.65% |
| 2020 | Guided (outfitter) | 50 | 10 | 20.00% | 111 | 23 | 10% |
| 2019 | Resident | 927 | 170 | 18.34% | 1,211 | 194 | — |
| 2019 | Nonresident | 106 | 10 | 9.43% | 185 | 14 | — |
| 2019 | Guided (outfitter) | 52 | 19 | 36.54% | 115 | 23 | — |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 230 | 230 | 1,165 | 3,118 |
| 2021 | 230 | 230 | 1,252 | 3,437 |
| 2020 | 230 | 230 | 976 | 2,511 |
| 2019 ⚠ | 230 | 231 | 1,085 | 2,596 |
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: the department recorded more licences issued than it offered. 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
- 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