goHUNT Insider Public Access

[CubsFan]

I recently sprung for goHUNT Insider and while I'm find it fun to tinker around with for hours I'm having trouble getting the value out of it that I had hoped for. There isn't any way to filter on amount of public access so most of the units that come up when I filter for good odds and good harvest rates always have poor access. If you click on the unit profile you do get the % private but that can be misleading and you can't filter on it anyways. Even the qualitative information on access isn't reliable. The same couple of phrases are used to characterize the access to public land and it seems like it isn't generated by a human with knowledge of the unit but rather a computer looking for X% greater than or less than some threshold. I'll see a unit described as having good public access and wonder why it isn't more difficult to draw and check onXmaps and it will be a complete checkerboard without a single contiguous block of public land.

Also unless I am missing it there is no information on cows or does. It be nice to know if I could pick up an easy/leftover cow or doe tag in a unit I might want to hunt elk. I'd like to know if my buddy can get a left over doe tag in a unit I might want to hunt buck pronghorn in since this will entice him to tag along with me.

 

[LopeHunter]

I use it to have a better idea for strategy on my non-resident NV applications. Eye-opening NV simulation GoHUNT ran to project how people applied in the prior year. NV releases info but since you have multiple choices and all are looked at before the next applicant is drawn then merely looking at tags awarded or first choices is just enough info to lead to faulty assumptions over what might be the easiest tags to draw.

Otherwise, usefulness is mostly to see what to expect for the points I have for a species in a state then drill down to compare other factors the state collects such as animal age, hunter success, days hunted, etc, when there are several choices I might be able to draw. The strategy articles cover this.

The unit recaps are not that valuable. Not much user-content added to the units, either.