Chapel hunts near the Gila area in southwestern New Mexico, using his ranch in Quemado as his base. For elk, he hunts mainly Units 16A and 15, both well known for producing trophy bulls. I have hunted both of these units multiple times and can say that there are some very big bulls available. These units are both designated as Quality and/or High Demand units in the regulations, which means licenses are either more expensive, harder to come by, or both. They are well suited to the Unit-Wide Authorization Certificates (landowner permits available in the E-Plus program) that allow you to hunt anywhere in the unit, including the public land that covers most of these units. The other option is Ranch-Only Authorization Certificates, which are restricted to a specific ranch and allow you to hunt another ranch only with written permission. Even worse, you can't hunt public or state land. For these reasons Chapel believes these permits are often too restrictive to warrant the cost. The Unit-Wide permits are now selling for around $7,000 for the rifle hunt, plus the $780 nonresident license and some minor stamp and habitat charges.
Chapel offers two rifle hunts and hosts four or five hunters a year. Over the years he has produced a 69 percent hunter success with an 80 percent shooting........(continued)
