I have been a sask resident all my life born and raised on a farm bordering Greenwater Lake Provincial Park. We own 3 quarters of land bordering the park that is excellent hunting ground and another 6 quarters scattered around the area that is also good land. I recently wanted to apply for a Hunting outfitting lease for deer/bear/ and possible geese. The first blow was that i was told i cannot outfitt on my own land. I need to get a chunk of the provincial park to outfitt in.. Now why is this. I own the land and have had deer and elk eating on my crop all year then when hunting season comes an outfitter back in the Park from my land makes his money off of animals i have been feeding all year long. I then asked for a chunk of land out of the Park just south of my land to outfitt on. I was told that the land had been all snapped up 10 years ago. Well on this one i call bull chit. An outfitter here has an absolutely huge area and he cannot acess the area i want because there are no public trails cut into that area....The only way to acess this chunk is to enter on my land. So this area is just goin to waste. The environement office said that there is no way i could prove that he wasn't using a little area, well its not a real little area probably 6X3 miles. So then he tells me the only way to get the area is to buy the outfitter out. The outfitter moved in here wasn't a local resident and bought this area when it cost him only a few hundred dollars for it...Me, lived here all my life have to pay 200 000 dollars for this area now because it has become a hot commodity. This is not fair at all. These guys bought the areas for next to nothin and are selling it for a pile. The also bought up as much as they could to prevent anyone else from getting it...They aren't using all of the area but they have it just so nobody new can outfitt beside them and give them competetion. Anyway you look at it this is not right, but i guess this is how saskatchewan promotes new business, and young entreprenuers. sorry but i am a little upset......any thoguhts guys?

Doesnt seem fair to me[:@] Do you have to have a license to put hunters on your own land???

Hiawatha, outfitting has been regulated to forest areas for some time to prevent rouge outfitting(what you are wanting to do). The forest fringe areas which include farmland are in the grandfather clause meaning prior to the regulation of the outfitting business certain areas backing, adjoining or along crownland may have been part of the original lease for the outfitting business or area. It was done largerly by the government and the SOA which was to prevent rogue, saturization(now remember outfitting wasn't as big back then, so they were worried that nobody would be able to turn a profit) and of course the government wanted a piece of the pie. Now that outfitting is a big as it is, the SOA members are greedy and want to make as much as they can, so unfortunately until they open up more of the province it will never happen my friend. It may not be fair but being regulated it does promote a equal opportunity in some regards. Think if every person who owned land outfitted or leased it for outfitting what would that do to the business and the resident hunters? As with any business they require investment and people who bought earlier are looking for return, else why invest? Some make peanunts others make mountains, may seem unfair but it is nature of the beast. If the area is for sale and you think it can generate revenue then why would you not with your area knowledge jump at the chance. BTW 200K cdn. for an established camp is not outrageous. How many tags are they allocated for the area? Need a partner???

Elk can only be hunted by resident hunters as you know, but you might consider offering a lease for a crew to establish a camp on your land and gain access, this is ligit (you sell them or lease them a small portion of the land for their camp) and I think you'd find many interested if they had sole access to some outstanding elk land in the regular season.

To my knowledge waterfowl have not been regulated yet, as this year at the SOA Convention it was the hot topic with outfitters.

Best of Luck!

Hiawatha, get in touch with the outfitter who's land is adjacent to yours and strike a deal with them. Maybe you can tell them that you'll use your land, accommodate, and guide the hunters who book through them.

Maybe they'll realize it's best to join forces to make more money with more available hunting ground without the hassles of more in thier camp? Plus, you can advise them that they can use your land for crossing.

Just a suggestion and maybe your in business.

If they are really regulating this oportunity in order to limit competition, then one would wonder at the legality of that kind of restraint on trade. Just because it's the government regulating it, doesn't guarantee it's legality. Still probably easier to figure out a way to play along, rather than to fight it.

I would like to hunt Elk , so how can I go about hunting your area ?...BT

Sorry bud you can't...elk hunting in sask is for sask residents only.....not even any guided seasons are available. And skeeter i was kind of thinking something along the lines of the elk camp idea but Elk Hunting in the park is not allowed unless you are drawn. And i will only own 3 quarters along the park so i would maybe be only to take 3 guys but i guess thats better than nothing. I'm really not to excited about having to invest a quarter mil into an outfitting operation with all the cwd, bse problems.....Who knows what the future may hold. Its a real gamble and a lot of money to be lost so i really have to do some thinking about this.

H, don't forget regular rifle season is two weeks long, plus draw and archery season. To be quite frank a lot of guys will pull eye teeth to get a crack at any legal elk in this province, success rate is really pretty low on an annual basis. With the call a guy doesn't need to go to them but rather draw them out for a peak. It is just an ider'.

If the area was good I can tell you a lot of guys would have no quams with dropping 1/4 on a camp right now! Last years was a awesome year and amongst all the BS, wars, economics in US & our high dollar they still came. No CWD has been found anywhere near your area, Manitoba is clean of it and have yet to find any cases, IMHO a nonissue on the CWD. I realize that is wack of money but depending on the tag allocation you could eat up that investment very quickly. You could look at adding a partner to ease the investment, share responsibility and gain. Like you said something to think about.

It is illegal to rogue outfit biggame and is non-legit, has been for 10 years at least. The area designed for non-resident/outfitting has changed since then somewhat, largerly to denote the rogues and appease local(residents) & first nations hunting concerns. However indian reserves being crown land are able to either run or lease their reserve for hunting purposes regardless of the location. Really is pretty cut and dry, like H mentioned ain't anything he can do but buy out the other guys biz! Well actually if you own land in his desginated outfitting area you could approach him to pay for access or for a few tags as a sub-lease for those parcells of land. I would try the later if he was reasonable and your investment would be very minimal..another thought!

skeeter i threw ya an email...i hope to hear from ya soon thanks.......

10/4 H!!!