If you're like many bowhunters, you didn't get your fill of archery hunting elk during the short early fall bow season. Here's a special late-season opportunity in one of Utah's specially managed trophy elk areas.

All photos in this column taken in November and December 2011

Usually you must apply for several years to draw an early-season tag, but you can buy a tag over the counter to take part in the special late archery hunt.

There are a lot of mature bulls because September gun and bow tags are extremely limited. In October there is a rifle spike elk hunt and a general season rifle mule deer, and the activity on public land gets the bulls to leave the higher public land and move to lower private land. By early November most of the elk are on lower private land. The special late bow hunt permits the landowners to get remunerated for providing a place for the elk to winter.

We lease the best land in this area for the late bow hunt, which starts Nov. 12 and runs through the end of December. From 2008 through 2010 about 14 hunters have killed seven bulls with two in the 350 class. Three of those hunters had to leave after one to two days for personal reasons, or the success rate might have been higher, but that's still a good success rate for an archery elk hunt. Most bulls are in the 270 to 330 category.

For 2011 we have leased additional property, so we have about 10,000 acres to hunt. We set up blinds in advance near alfalfa haystacks that draw the elk within bow range.

These animals are extremely wary, and we have learned that the stands must be 45 to 50 yards from the hay, or the elk will usually detect you. So be prepared to shoot at that distance. Sorry longbow hunters, this hunt is probably not for you.

You can choose to hunt any six days between Nov. 12 and Dec. 31. If you're a local you can hunt weekends. You can hunt more days at a rate of $200 per day, depending on scheduling.

The nonresident hunting license is $65 in 2011 and the archery elk tag is $388. You need hunters safety certification if born after Dec. 31, 1965. You can buy both the license and tag at a license vendor in town.

These are wild, free-roaming bulls, not domesticated elk that have been raised behind high fences, so they are unpredictable and wary.

"I saw 54 different bulls on my hunt in the winter of 2009-2010," one bowhunter told me. "You see a lot of six points, and I can almost guarantee you'll get a good, close-range shot if you're patient and can hold still. I had 15 bulls come to one stand."

One of our bowhunters last year saw eight or nine six-point bulls one day last year and said he had never seen so many mature bulls except on Deseret Land & Livestock ranch, which is much more expensive to hunt.

The ranch ranges from about 6,300 feet to about 8,000 feet in elevation.

"A lot of elk move down onto us as soon as the early hunts start on public land in the high elevation country above here," the rancher said. "They know where they're not being bothered."

One of the rancher's sons drew an early season bow tag last year and shot a nice 6x6 in September. The rancher himself drew a muzzleloader elk tag a couple of years ago and got a mature 6x6. But you don't need to draw a tag to take part in the late bow hunt.

If you want to be pretty sure of taking home some meat, you can buy an additional cow elk tag for a different ranch in a bordering unit that is only a mile from the town where you will stay, and you can hunt there with a rifle during your trip. We charge $600 for a cow elk voucher if you've already booked an archery elk hunt. The state cow elk tag is not included, and it's about $220.

All photos in this column taken in November and December 2011

Varies according to weather and natural elk movements. From 2008 to 2010 hunter success was 60 percent. But in 2011 we had the driest December in more than 150 years, which resulted in more difficult hunting. Even so, six of our nine hunters had bulls within 30 yards or so. In 2012 we expect to expand our hunting territory to include a bordering ranch, which will allow us to do spot-and-stalk hunting in select areas.

Fly to Salt Lake City and rent a car for the drive to the ranch. Sometimes we can arrange round-trip transportation to the airport from the ranch, which is about two hours away, for $200 per group.

Accommodations and meals are not included. Most hunters stay in the only motel in town or in a nicer motel 20 miles away. A local restaurant is open early enough for breakfast and late enough for supper.

Season: Nov. 14-Dec. 31

About 10,000 acres of private land in the foothills of a large mountain range.

All photos in this column taken in 2010