Having thoughts about moving out to Colorado and was wondering how good is the hunting? I' m looking in the eastern regions like Colorado Springs and areas in and around Denver. Wondering about big game hunting and upland birds. Seems like there' s a lot of regulations and restricted seasons associated with the draw process. Is it tough to gain public access? Here in the south we get long liberal seasons and land leases are available so I' m trying to compare the two. Thanks fellas!

Ok, I moved to Colorado 11 years ago from Wisconsin, mostly for the hunting. I can tell you that as far as elk hunting, you can go every year, and it' s great hunting. But it just matters on what area' s you want to hunt. There is a lot of leg work learning the reg' s and how to apply so that you always get a tag, and still can build pref points for a trophy area.

Deer hunting is all draw, but I personally hunt in a area that I draw in every year, and if you are willing to doe hunt, you can draw a tag just about anywhere

I will tell you straight up that the bird hunting is pathetic in this state, compared to your home state anyway. If you like to dove hunt, we have good hunting, as we do with geese. All of the grouse hunting is weak at best. The pheasant hunting has been awesome the last 4-5 years out on the eastern plains.

The mountains have great access, thousands and thousands of public lands. You will never run out of places to hunt there. I do have problems with getting access on the plains though, for deer anyway. Just about anyone will let you shoot speed goats off of there property.

Hope some of this helped

Yip, what Jorgy said is pretty accurate. The hunting opps. are pretty good for most species. Gaining access to private property is tough, especially for big game. There is good hunting to be found, just takes some leg work sometimes.

New to the forum and maybe over stepping my bounds right off the bat. I would say that the pheasant hunting has been some of the poorest in the last 10 years. I have been hunting in CO all my life and I haven' t had this much trouble getting birds in a long time. This is mostly due to the drought. Just not as many birds as before. [>:]

I would suggest if you do move to the state, do your homework and find a variety of lands that may be possibilities. I would definately contact the DOW offices and find out about many of the public land sights out on the plains. They are always more than happy to provide that information. I have found the some of these public spots aren' t used that heavily and offer great spots for upland birds. Many of the states hunters utilize private lands out on the plains and don' t take advantage of the publice sites.

Yeah Colorado has the best Elk Hunting in the Country and i hear that there are too many Elk in that state so they are having over the counter tags which is great. Best place to go is northwest colorado near meeker and every time i go there we get one.