Hunting season is almost over for most, but FWP Public Information Officer Vivica Crowser says the elk numbers coming through southwest Montana’s check stations continues to be higher than last year.

"All told, the Anaconda, Bonner and Darby Check Stations have tallied 9,317 hunters, 280 elk, 63 mule deer, 461 white-tailed deer, 9 black bears, 3 bighorn sheep and 2 wolves through the first five weekends of the big game hunting season," Crowser said

The hunter success rate at the Bonner check station is an extremely high 20 percent, however, there don’t appear to be as many hunters as in years past.

"It is down form last year, and last year was down from the prior years, and so, for  example, if we look this year, we've had 9,317 hunter trips through the three western Montana hunter check stations, last year we were at  9,800, so about a 500 trip drop from last year and that's about a 1,000 trip drop from the year before that," Crowser said.

Time is running out to go hunting, general rifle season will come to an end on November 26th.

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