Unit 23

Elephant Rock and Haystack Butte serve as prominent visual anchors across the open country. The Sierra Ancha dominates the northern ridge system, offering high-point glassing for surveying basins. Tonto Creek and the Salt River provide natural travel corridors and navigation reference lines.

The Mogollon Rim boundary to the north is a distant but significant terrain feature marking the unit's upper limit. Key named basins—Greenback Valley, Del Shay Basin, Hackberry Basin, Curry Basin—orient hunters to major terrain blocks. The Narrows and Hells Gate passages offer concentrated travel routes.

Multiple named springs (Hackberry Basin Spring, Felton Spring, Neal Spring) and tank systems provide both water sources and hunt reference points.

Elevation spans from about 2,000 feet in the river bottoms to nearly 8,000 feet on upper ridges, creating distinct habitat bands. Lower elevations host desert scrub and sagebrush flats with scattered juniper and pinyon, interspersed with canyon bottoms supporting cottonwood and riparian growth. Mid-elevations transition to ponderosa-juniper-oak woodland.

Upper ridges and the Mogollon Rim approach approach higher forest cover. This vertical relief concentrates wildlife movements along predictable seasonal corridors. The moderate forest cover indicates open-to-mixed country—plenty of glassing opportunity in basins and ridge systems, with timbered refuges at higher elevations where animals winter or seek shade.

Eight hundred thirty-five miles of roads span the unit, but density across this vast area creates fair access—enough infrastructure to reach hunting areas without being overrun. Roads are dispersed rather than concentrated, meaning most accessible trailheads serve multiple hunters. Lower-elevation basins and creek bottoms near roads draw predictable pressure, while rougher ridge systems and upper canyon country see less traffic due to terrain difficulty and remoteness.

Avoid obvious staging areas and road-adjacent flats; the unit's size and complexity reward hunters willing to work harder terrain where fewer people venture. High terrain complexity (8.8/10) means route-finding skills separate successful hunters from those struggling with navigation.

Unit 23 encompasses the Tonto Basin country between the Salt River and Tonto Creek systems, anchored by the confluence at the western boundary and extending northeast toward the Mogollon Rim and White Mountain Apache Reservation border. The unit is substantial in size, stretching across rolling basin and ridge terrain that transitions from lower desert valleys to higher pinyon-juniper and ponderosa slopes. The Sierra Ancha range and associated ridges define much of the northern terrain.

This is foundational Arizona hunting country—historically productive for multiple species due to the diverse elevation and habitat mosaic.

Tonto Creek and the Salt River are the perennial anchors, flowing year-round through canyon bottoms. Multiple springs distributed across basins—Hackberry Basin Spring, Bear Head Spring, Felton Spring, Edwards Spring, and others—support hunting efforts away from major drainages. Tank systems (Twin Butte Tank, Willow Tank, Gisela Tank, Tom Tank, Sam Tank, Bull Tank) provide reliable water in open country.

Several named creeks and washes (Cottonwood Creek, Del Shay Creek, Soldier Camp Creek, Methodist Creek) flow seasonally. Moderate water availability means water sources are neither abundant nor scarce; knowing tank and spring locations is essential for planning daily movements and glassing positions.

Unit 23 supports elk, mule deer, white-tailed deer, pronghorn, mountain sheep, desert sheep, black bear, mountain lion, javelina, and bison. Elk concentrate in mid-to-upper elevation timber and canyon breaks during summer, migrate downslope with snow and cold. Early season targets elk in higher ponderosa and mixed-conifer habitat; rut hunting focuses on canyon systems and ridges where animals funnel between basins.

Mule and white-tailed deer occupy mixed elevations—mule deer favor open ridges and transitions, white-tails prefer canyon bottoms and thicker cover. Pronghorn hunting happens in lower basins and flats where sight distances are long. Mountain and desert sheep use cliff systems and high ridges away from main drainages.

Water availability across the unit means animals don't concentrate at single sources, requiring careful glassing and methodical coverage of multiple basin systems.