Bannock County Hunting Overview

Bannock County hunting units

Of county: how much of the county lies in the unit. Of unit: how much of the unit lies in the county.

Idaho sets big game seasons unit by unit, and Bannock County touches 5 of them; 30% of the county lies in Unit 71. 3 units straddle the line with Power County, more than with any other county.

Unit shares from the IDFG Game Units layer overlaid on Census county polygons (GIS shares of land area, both ways); elk zone of each unit from the IDFG Elk Zones layer; wolf zones from the IDFG Wolf Zones layer; CWD units from the 2026 brochure; bear tables from the 2026 brochure. Checked November 12, 2026.

Chronic wasting disease and wolves in Bannock County

The 2026 CWD zone and testing units all lie outside Bannock County.

Bannock County wolf zones and wolf seasons

On the wolf zone layer Bannock County reads Southern Idaho; season dates depend on the unit and the land type. To trap a wolf, hold a trapping license and complete wolf trapper education; transmitting cameras became legal for wolf trap checks on July 1, 2026.

CWD zone, transport and testing rules from the Big Game 2026 Seasons and Rules p. 9; 2026 changes from IDFG, What hunters need to know about CWD requirements for 2026; county units from the IDFG CWD zone rules; wolf rules from the 2026 brochure; wolf zones from the IDFG Wolf Zones layer. Checked November 12, 2026.

Bannock County controlled hunts for 2026

Hunts whose units reach the county; the hunt area itself can be smaller than the unit.

IDFG hunt numbers with a unit in Bannock County add up to 28, namely 15 deer, 6 elk and 7 moose. Their 2026 tag counts add up to 1,344, a sum that includes tags for ground outside Bannock County.

Idaho draws controlled hunts at random: apply May 1 to June 5 for deer, elk, pronghorn and fall bear, April 1 to 30 for moose, sheep and goat. Moose, bighorn sheep and goat hunts below follow the 2025 and 2026 brochure (2026 season).

Deer draws reaching Bannock County (15)

Bannock County: controlled elk (6)

Moose tags drawn around Bannock County (7)

Hunt numbers, types, units, dates, bags and 2026 tags from the IDFG Hunt Planner hunt pages (each hunt number links its page) matched to the Idaho Big Game 2026 Seasons and Rules and the Moose, Bighorn Sheep and Mountain Goat 2025 and 2026 brochure; counties are whole units, so a hunt area can be smaller. Application periods from the 2026 brochure, the moose, sheep and goat brochure and the spring bear page. Checked November 12, 2026.

Bannock County public land, owner by owner

Private land in Access Yes! and Large Tracts is open only on program terms.

The merged map of public hunting land in Bannock County reaches 188,278 acres, 26% of the county surface. Sort the owners by size and national forest comes first, 113,196 acres within the county line. Roughly 113,151 forest acres in the county belong to the Westside Ranger District (Caribou-Targhee National Forest), the largest of 1 districts.

72,157 acres are BLM-managed, and 72,156 of those report to the Pocatello Field Office. Endowment land (42,020 GIS acres) sits outside the merged total; the IDFG brochure lists it among its access programs. The 91,038 acres of reservation and trust land are not public hunting ground; entering them to hunt without tribal permission is unlawful.

Tribes holding land in Bannock County

• Fort Hall Reservation91,004 GIS acres · closed

Bannock County public places by owner

Open land a short drive from Bannock County

• Arbon – East Bench (Access Yes!)20 miles, Access Yes! property
• Daniels Valley (Access Yes!)21 miles, Access Yes! property
• Chesterfield (Access Yes!)24 miles, Access Yes! property
• Arbon – Southwest Bench (Access Yes!)26 miles, Access Yes! property
• Access Yes! property 593827 miles, Access Yes! property
• Excalibur Ranches – Rockland East Bench (Access Yes!)31 miles, Access Yes! property

Acres are GIS measures of polygons with water over 2 square km removed, not official acreage: IDFG WMA layer, PAD-US 4.1 (forest, grassland, BLM, refuge, park, endowment, Reclamation, military, DOE and tribal land), IDFG Access Yes! 2026 layer, IDFG Large Tracts layer; refuges counted only when listed in 50 CFR 32.31; tribal rule from 18 U.S.C. 1165; closures from the 2026 brochure; Craters of the Moon from the NPS laws and policies page. Checked November 12, 2026.

Bannock County banquets and classes

Kinds ahead here: DU conservation dinner, RMEF chapter banquet, hunter certification and trapper certification. Count: 4 dates ahead.

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Close to Bannock County

The four cards are the counties whose middles sit nearest this one; the buttons open statewide topics.