You want to increase your chances of getting that trophy do you?  Wise decission you just made! But where do you start? Well let’s look at who an outfitter is. An outfitter doe not have to be a guide but all guides work for outfitters. Outfitters can be a group or business co-op that have purchased an outfitters license and sell hunting and fishing packages.  Game tags are allocated to each outfitter based on the size of their operation in square miles.  This ensures the government has control on management of the resource.  If Governemnt surveys show an area or species is failing or being over pressured they limit the number of tags for that particular area.  Outfitters only have a limited supply of tags but they can purchase tags from other outfitters but still have to take the animal in that other outfitters area.

How does this affect you? Well lets say your buddies went last year to Joe’s and got a record book deer. Everyone, would here about a new record and want to hunt in that area. After all where there is one there will be more. However, Joe can only get 50 tags for deer in his area, that means he can only bring in 50 hunters to fill those tags. Now there may be 5 or 6 outfitters with licenses for that big game area all with 50 tags.  With a potential world record in that area how many other outfitters are going to sell tags to Joe’s, not many. After all they can guide in that area so are going to book their hunts as well, this could put over hunting pressure on that area and affect hunting in there for years.  You take 300 mature animals out of an area the gene pool is weakened.

That’s nice but what does that mean to me? All non-resident hunters for Big Game must have a Guide, all licensed guides work for Outfitters and Outfitters will have licenses and tags for the game within their territory, only their guests can hunt in these areas. The price for your tag with Joe’s just went up because everyone wants to hunt there. Everyone wants to take an animal so anything in the larger classes is going to get shot as fast as they are found. It takes a few years for a deer to reach the 200" class, if you take all the 150 – 190 class animals out, when will you find a 200" again. All this means that do not select your outfitter based on someone else’s success. 

Bird hunting and fishing does not require guides, but you still have to know what area you want to hunt, Saskatchewan is a very large province with different times for hunting as the migration progresses.

Now decide on an Outfitter/Guide for your trip.

It’s time to start asking questions, and the best place to start is the outfitter in charge. You don’t want any ‘financial surprises’ or think you will be enjoying fine dining only to have cold cereal for breakfast and a cold sandwich for dinner, you and the outfitter need to know. In order to have a more enjoyable hunting trip with your guide or outfitter, it is important to have a firm understanding of the services and accommodations being provided or not included and what you will pay extra for.  Be sure to follow the list found here Ask Outfitter Questions:  

Transportation:

Fly In Trips:

Ask about the operation:

Ask questions specific to the trip:

Verify the information given to you: