New Mexico · Elk · any legal big-game sporting arm
New Mexico elk hunt ELK-1-281
Unit 16B/22. 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 2026 draw did
New Mexico offered 25 licences on hunt code ELK-1-281 in 2026 and issued 25 — the hunt filled. Among the three pools the state draws separately, 219 nonresident applicants ranked it first and 1 drew it, 0.46%; 417 resident applicants ranked it first and 21 drew it, 5.04%; 82 guided (outfitter) applicants ranked it first and 1 drew it, 1.22%.
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 | 417 | 21 | 5.04% | 534 | 21 | 84% |
| 2026 | Nonresident | 219 | 1 | 0.46% | 374 | 2 | 8% |
| 2026 | Guided (outfitter) | 82 | 1 | 1.22% | 122 | 2 | 8% |
| 2025 | Resident | 448 | 18 | 4.02% | 532 | 21 | 84% |
| 2025 | Nonresident | 236 | 2 | 0.85% | 398 | 2 | 8% |
| 2025 | Guided (outfitter) | 74 | 2 | 2.70% | 118 | 2 | 8% |
| 2024 | Resident | 459 | 19 | 4.14% | 531 | 21 | 84% |
| 2024 | Nonresident | 266 | 2 | 0.75% | 382 | 2 | 8% |
| 2024 | Guided (outfitter) | 115 | 0 | 0.00% | 94 | 2 | 8% |
| 2023 | Resident | 427 | 20 | 4.68% | 517 | 21 | 84% |
| 2023 | Nonresident | 274 | 1 | 0.36% | 397 | 2 | 8% |
| 2023 | Guided (outfitter) | 177 | 2 | 1.13% | 134 | 2 | 8% |
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 | 25 | 25 | 718 | 1,748 |
| 2025 | 25 | 25 | 758 | 1,806 |
| 2024 | 25 | 25 | 840 | 1,847 |
| 2023 | 25 | 25 | 878 | 1,926 |
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.
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