Manti/San Rafael Mule Deer Hunting, Utah
Utah hunt unit · 7,655 sq mi
Moderate — 1–2 points
The any legal weapon hunt, for an adult Utah resident, by the preference points that drew reliably in the 2026 draw. Each general-season weapon is its own permit with its own draw — the table below rates every one.
The unit also has a limited-entry late muzzleloader hunt, a separate draw that uses bonus points. Its dedicated-hunter buck hunt is separate and not covered here.
What hunting Manti/San Rafael is like
The Manti/San Rafael is big country — 7,655 square miles running from valley floor around 3,600 feet up to 11,300 feet on the high ridges of Skyline Drive. Most of the ground is gentle to moderate, with steeper breaks in about 13% of the unit and only 3% rugged, so this reads as rolling country with pockets of steep, broken terrain rather than a unit that is predominantly steep. On the Manti side, canyon roads run up from towns like Fairview, Ephraim and Mayfield to connect with Skyline Drive, some of them rough going, and hiking the side roads and trails off those canyons is how hunters get into the better pockets away from traffic. The San Rafael side is desert BLM country with far fewer developed roads and very little seasonal deer movement. Areas worth knowing by name include Upper Fish Creek and its tributaries — Gooseberry Creek, Silver Creek, C Canyon and Straight Fork — a roadless stretch on the north end reached from North Skyline Drive or Scofield Reservoir, along with the Pondtown Creek drainage, Trough Spring Ridge near Scofield, the ridge east of Electric Lake, and Gentry Mountain off SR-10 near Huntington Reservoir.
About 81% of the unit is generally open to hunting across BLM, National Forest, State Trust Land and Wildlife Management Area ground, with most state trust parcels opened under a standing access agreement — though individual parcels can still be leased or restricted. A separate 4.1% of the unit falls inside Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, open to hunting under its own local rules and closures, worth checking before heading in. About 13% of the unit is private, concentrated in places like the bottom two miles of Upper Fish Creek, which sits in a CWMU where permit holders may not hunt. Camping on the Manti side runs through developed US Forest Service campgrounds on the Manti-La Sal National Forest, plus dispersed camping across most of the forest; the San Rafael side has little in the way of developed campgrounds but plenty of dispersed BLM camping.
Four wildfires have burned into the unit's northwest and north sides in recent years — the Coal Hollow and Pole Creek fires and the Trail Mountain fire, all from 2018, and the Bear fire from 2021. All four are now five to eight years past burning, which means the brush and saplings coming back in those burns are getting thick enough — five feet and more in places — to hide deer well, with downed, tipped-over timber building up as burned trees continue to fall. Check for current fire closures and restrictions before hunting those areas.
General-season buck deer — drawn with preference points (2026)
General-season buck deer in Utah is drawn, and each weapon is its own permit with its own draw. It uses preference points: permits go first to the applicants holding the most points, in random order within each point level. Every year an application does not draw earns a point, and drawing a permit uses them all. A fifth of the permits are set aside for youth hunters. Applying here does not affect limited-entry deer bonus points, so a hunter can apply for both in the same year.
| Season | Dates | Legal deer | Draw (adult resident) | Rut phase |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Archery | August 15 – September 11 | Buck | Moderate — 1–2 points | Summer Range / Bachelor Pattern, Velvet Shed / Early Fall Transition |
| Muzzleloader | September 23 – October 1 | Buck | Moderate — 1–2 points | Velvet Shed / Early Fall Transition, Early Fall Migration / Nocturnal Buck Phase |
| Any Legal Weapon | October 17 – October 25 | Buck | Moderate — 1–2 points | Early Fall Migration / Nocturnal Buck Phase, Early Pre-Rut / Migration Corridor Staging |
Draw bands are for an adult Utah resident in the 2026 draw: the lowest preference-point level that drew each hunt reliably. There is no random half in this draw, so hunters well below a band should expect to wait.
Archery · August 15 – September 11
Archery season covers the tail end of summer bachelor patterns and into velvet shed, with bucks still holding on or near the same high country they used all summer, typically at 7,500 feet and above, and very little migration happening yet. Glass at first light to find a buck, watch where he beds for the day in shade or on a north-facing slope, then work a stalk while he's bedded; in the evening glass again, either for another stalk or just to mark him down for the next morning. Water is rarely a limiting factor on the Manti side, though in some years hunting a seep or stock tank can still pay off. On the west face, canyon roads out of Fairview, Ephraim and Mayfield connect to Skyline Drive, and the higher aspen and sagebrush meadows near water tend to hold mature bucks, while alfalfa fields down in the agricultural valleys draw younger bucks in the mornings and evenings.
Muzzleloader · September 23 – October 1
By the muzzleloader hunt bucks have shed velvet but keep much the same daily pattern, bedding in shady pockets and draws and holding close to their summer ground, with migration still essentially absent. The approach doesn't change much from bow season — glass early to locate a buck, note his bedding cover, and be ready for him to bed earlier in the day and stay down longer as the days shorten. A buck that seems to vanish from a hillside is usually still there, tucked into a crevice or draw nearby rather than gone. Recommended areas remain the same country used all summer: Upper Fish Creek and its tributaries on the roadless north end, Pondtown Creek, Trough Spring Ridge above the Skyline Coal Mine, the ridge east of Electric Lake, and Gentry Mountain off SR-10, along with the canyon roads feeding Skyline Drive from the west-face towns.
Any Legal Weapon · October 17 – October 25
The any-legal-weapon hunt runs through late October, when bucks are increasingly nocturnal and migration is just beginning to be a factor — deer may start shifting toward rutting ground late in this hunt, especially if an early snowstorm pushes things along, so it pays to glass the country between summer range and the lower benches deer will eventually move to. Most years migration doesn't get going in earnest until later, but this unit's fall movement is weather dependent, and big snow in late October has been enough to get deer moving even during this hunt. East of Skyline Drive and south of Huntington Canyon there's good access along ridge tops and lower canyons, with plenty of country to hike into away from roads — much of it steep, but holding better bucks for the effort. The Fish Creek drainage system, Pondtown Creek, Trough Spring Ridge and Gentry Mountain remain productive places to concentrate glassing.
Limited-entry late muzzleloader buck deer (2026)
Limited entry is Utah's drawn buck hunt, managed for older bucks, with far fewer permits than the general season. It is drawn with bonus points: half the permits go to the applicants holding the most points, and the other half are drawn at random with one extra entry for every point held — so applicants below the reliable level do draw. A Utah resident may apply for only one limited-entry species a year.
| Season | Dates | Legal deer | Rut phase |
|---|---|---|---|
| Late Muzzleloader A separate limited-entry permit, drawn with bonus points. | October 28 – November 5 | Buck | Early Pre-Rut / Migration Corridor Staging |
This band describes the Late Muzzleloader limited-entry buck deer hunt, the only one on this unit, for a Utah resident in the 2026 draw: the lowest bonus-point level that drew reliably. Half of Utah's limited-entry permits go to the applicants with the most bonus points and half are drawn at random, with an extra entry for each point, so applicants below this level can draw. Nonresidents can take substantially more points.
Late Muzzleloader · October 28 – November 5
The late muzzleloader hunt falls in the pre-rut staging period, when deer may already be working from summer range toward the ground they'll use during the rut, so glassing the country between the two is the right strategy as the season progresses. Cold has set in by early November, with highs only around 50°F and lows near freezing, and enough snowfall can start to show on the ground to nudge deer lower — though on this unit any real migration push more often waits until later in November. Water isn't a limiting factor on the Manti side even this late, and the same core areas apply: Upper Fish Creek and its tributaries, Pondtown Creek, Trough Spring Ridge, the ridge east of Electric Lake, and Gentry Mountain, along with the canyon roads and Skyline Drive corridor that connect the west-face towns to the high country. This is a separate limited-entry permit drawn with bonus points, for any buck, not the general buck tag used in the other three seasons.
Terrain & elevation
- Elevation
- 3,600–11,300 ft, typically around 5,800 ft
- Slope breakdown
- 58% gentle · 27% moderate · 13% steep · 3% rugged
- Ground you can count on
- ~6,232 sq mi
Habitat & cover
What grows here, by elevation. Each band adds to 100% on its own — these are shares of that band, not of the unit.
Lower elevations
- Sagebrush82%
- Other cover17%
- Grass and meadow1%
Mid elevations
- Sagebrush83%
- Other cover12%
- Conifer3%
- Grass and meadow2%
Higher elevations
- Sagebrush48%
- Conifer30%
- Aspen17%
- Other cover3%
- Grass and meadow2%
Cover classes from the USGS National Land Cover Database. “Other cover” is the remainder — bare ground, water, agriculture and developed land — left unnamed rather than guessed at.
Recent fires
Wildfires in the last several seasons that burned a meaningful share of Manti/San Rafael. Fire perimeters show where a fire burned, not how hot — and closures change through the year, so check current fire closures and restrictions before you go.
- Coal Hollow fire, 2018 — about 30,000 acres in the unit, mostly on its northwest side.
- Pole Creek fire, 2018 — about 27,000 acres in the unit, mostly on its northwest side.
- Trail Mountain fire, 2018 — about 18,000 acres in the unit, mostly on its northwest side.
- Bear fire, 2021 — about 12,000 acres in the unit, mostly on its north side.
Fire perimeters from the National Interagency Fire Center.
Land & access
About 81% of Manti/San Rafael is public land a hunter can generally count on — BLM, National Forest, State Trust Land and Wildlife Management Areas. Another 2% is public land closed to state-licensed hunting — National Park Service.
- BLM55%
- National Forest18%
- State Trust Land7%
- Wildlife Management Areas2%
- Glen Canyon National Recreation Area4%
- National Park Service2%
- Unclassified ownership<1%
- Private13%
Most Utah State Trust Land is open to hunting under a standing state access agreement. Individual parcels can be leased or restricted, so check the parcel before planning around it.
Glen Canyon National Recreation Area is National Park Service land where hunting is allowed with a Utah licence, subject to the recreation area's own local closures — check them before you go. National parks and monuments are closed to hunting.
Where deer live in the unit
Utah's statewide deer habitat mapping, by layer: how much of Manti/San Rafael each one covers. The layers overlap, so they do not add to 100%, and a layer that is small or missing here says nothing on its own about where deer are.
- Winter Range16%used in winter
- Crucial Winter Range15%the part of Winter Range considered essential to the herd — inside Winter Range, not added to it
- Yearlong Range14%the only layer that means year-round use
- Summer Range11%used in summer
- Crucial Summer Range9%the part of Summer Range considered essential to the herd — inside Summer Range, not added to it
- Transition Range4%used moving between summer and winter range
Fall weather
- September — highs around 80°F, lows around 50°F
- October — highs around 66°F, lows around 38°F
- November — highs around 50°F, lows around 27°F, about 0.5 in of snowfall
Manti/San Rafael deer hunting FAQ
Do I need preference points to draw a general-season buck tag on the Manti/San Rafael?
No points are required to apply — anyone can put in. Archery, muzzleloader and any-legal-weapon buck permits here are drawn using preference points, with permits going first to the highest point holders and a random order within each point level, so points improve position but are not a requirement to apply.
How many preference points does it take to draw the general-season rifle (any legal weapon) hunt?
The any-legal-weapon hunt, like the archery and muzzleloader buck hunts on this unit, carries a Moderate draw difficulty in the 1–2 point range for an adult Utah resident. That's the level that has drawn reliably; applicants with fewer points can still draw because of the random ordering within each point level.
What's the difference between the general-season hunts and the late muzzleloader limited-entry hunt here?
The three general-season buck hunts — archery, muzzleloader, and any legal weapon — are drawn every year with preference points, each weapon its own separate permit and draw. The Late Muzzleloader hunt is a completely separate limited-entry permit drawn with bonus points instead, offering far fewer tags on the same ground, with half the permits going to the highest point holders and half drawn at random with extra entries per point held.
Which hunts on this unit fall during the November rut?
None of them. The archery, muzzleloader, any-legal-weapon and Late Muzzleloader hunts all fall before the mid-November to mid-December rut window on this unit, so none of the four seasons coincide with peak rutting activity.
How much of the Manti/San Rafael unit is public land a hunter can count on?
About 81% of the unit is generally open to hunting, spread across BLM, National Forest, State Trust Land and Wildlife Management Area ground. An additional 4.1% falls inside Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, which is open to hunting under its own local rules rather than counted in that generally-open figure.
How difficult is it to draw the Late Muzzleloader limited-entry tag?
That hunt carries a Premium draw difficulty in the 10–19 bonus point range for a Utah resident, the level that has drawn reliably in recent years. Because half the permits are set aside for a random draw with one extra entry per bonus point held, applicants below that level can still draw, just not routinely.
Data sources & methodology
- Utah Division of Wildlife Resources — Big game hunting — limited-entry, general-season and antlerless deer permits
- Utah DWR — What hunters should know for the 2026 deer and elk hunts — 2026 buck deer hunt dates and changes
- Utah DWR — Big Game Application Guidebook — how bonus points and the limited-entry draw work
- Utah DWR — Hunt Planner — unit boundaries, and the DWR's unit and biologist notes the written guide draws on
- Utah DWR — Supporting Utah's mule deer — mule deer habitat and seasonal range
- Utah Trust Lands Administration — Trust Lands & You — the hunter access agreement that opens most state trust land
- USGS / MRLC — National Land Cover Database — habitat and cover classes by elevation band
- USGS PAD-US — Protected Areas Database of the United States — land ownership and access
- Daymet daily climate, 1991–2020 (Oak Ridge National Laboratory) — fall weather
- National Interagency Fire Center — wildfire perimeters — recent fires, their size and where they burned
Draw difficulty is a qualitative band, not published odds — the notes under each season table state exactly which hunts the bands describe. Land shares are separate, non-overlapping categories. Confirm current dates and rules in the Utah Big Game Field Regulations guidebook before you hunt. Unit data last updated September 29, 2026.