The onX brand and Arizona wildlife officials are opening thousands of acres of private ranch to the public.
Hunters in Arizona will soon have a ton of new public land options available after the announcement of a partnership between onXmaps and the Arizona Game and Fish Department.
The outdoor mapping company and wildlife agency began working together in part thanks to professional hunter Randy Newberg, who has always been a big public lands advocate. Under the new partnership between the agencies, thousands of acres of the famous Elkhorn Ranch will soon be open for hunters.
This includes approximately 2,830 acres of private land and 6,170 of leased state trust land.
Over the last few years, onX has invested a great deal of time and money on analyzing access to America’s public lands. More specifically, they found millions of acres that were “land locked” within private land with no direct access roads.
It’s part of a greater issue onX and many wildlife agencies have been trying to solve for years now, and that’s simply a place for people to hunt.
“Through the analysis of our public and private land data, we’ve noticed one glaring issue: access,” onX Founder Eric Siegfried said in a press release. “Though the western U.S. is rich with public lands, we’re finding that access is limited in areas. It’s our goal to use onX mapping data to not only discover these areas of limited access throughout the United States, but to also open them up to the public.”
There will be some special rules for accessing the ranch’s lands, which are detailed on the AZGFD website. Most notably, all recreational users must have an access pass and must sign in at designated access points.
It’s also foot traffic only, so no bringing along your ATV. Hunters interested in hunting the ranch can fill out a form online for their access pass.
The agreement for access is already set to renew though 2028. Arizona Game and Fish thanked both the ranch and onX for their cooperation in helping give hunters more places to hunt.
“This not only ensures that responsible hunters and other recreationists can access the approximately 9,000-acre ranch itself but the thousands of acres of State Trust lands which lay beyond the ranch boundaries,” AGFD Landowner Relations Program Coordinator Kyle Dutro said in a press release. “Without a partner like onX to support this effort financially and a willing landowner, projects like this would not be possible.”
Dutro also said the funding provided under the partnership will allow the ranch to complete improvements to habitat on the property.
onX already has topo and boundary data on the ranch and surrounding lands available through their onX Hunt app online.
For more outdoor content from Travis Smola, be sure to follow him on Twitter and check out his Geocaching and Outdoors with Travis Youtube channels.
NEXT: HOW TO USE ONXMAPS TO ACTUALLY IMPROVE YOUR HUNT
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The post One Example of How onX is Helping with Land and Water Access appeared first on Wide Open Spaces.
