How Much To Tip a Hunting Guide?

I know the short answer is it all depends, but how much in what situation?
There's different hunts like a morning goose hunting on the Eastern Shore from a field blind, then there's outfitters and guided hunts for everything from pigeons to elephant.
I want to go on a moose hunt and New Foundland seems the most practical destination. I sold off most of my gun collection after retiring and time is creeping up on me. I'm not a rich guy but I have enough cash in my budget for a hunt.
A moose hunt with a reputable guide runs around $5-6000.
Do you tip 15-20%? This is where it starts to get detailed.
Who do you tip? There's place with a main cabin you hunt from. Some places have spike camps on a lake that you fly into and stay the week.
Some places you drive to, some you drive into the area and they pick you up or fly to and they pick you up from the airport.

So you tip the guide, if its one hunter or two do you split it. The guide might shadow you all day or could drop you off and point you in a direction and wait for a shot or pick you up at dusk.
How about if there's a house keeper and/or cook?
The spike camp pilot, the drive from the airport, the outfitter/owner, the butcher, the helpers. Some guides do it all and that would make it simple.
So 20% would be $1200 and you ride into camp and shoot a moose the first morning near the truck OR you hunt hard all week and have the worst luck ever. Naturally you would vary the amount accordingly.
So do you vary 15-20%, $100-200 a day to the guide, leave $100 for the cook, give $1200 to somebody and let them divvy it up or split it up between who earned it?
Does anybody know how it works?

We tip 20% for guided hunts. We always tip the head of the outfitter to give to his guys. Fishing trips we tip the Captain to give to the mate.

Guides don’t make a ton and their income comes from the tips fir the most part.

Now if your guide is a D bag adjust accordingly. I once went on a goose trip with nothing but cops. The guide spent 4 hours shitting on cops not knowing we were cops. We did still tip 20% because the outfitter did some adjustments to make our trip my enjoyable but i really wished we coulda told him “Everyone in your outfit gets 20% but that guy gets 10%”

My boss did a few day bear hunt in Maine earlier this year. Tip was around $500

I don't think there's one standard etiquette when it comes to tipping guides.

For example, when I do a guided pheasant hunt at PVF in PA, we usually tip $30-$40 per hunter because that's what we've seen others do. The max they'll let one guide do is 5 hunters. After that, the group gets too big for one guide to handle properly so they force a split into two groups.

For your moose hunt, I think you plan on the $1200 total and take that in cash and then divvy it up as you see fit. Definitely don't give it to one person it'll never "trickle-down" if you do, I know this from experience being a cook at one point in my life and seeing customers tell the waiter/maître d' to make sure everyone gets a cut only to see the kitchen totally left out at the end of the day. The cook probably isn't expecting a tip, but you'll make their day if they get one. You can also let the guide know you've tipped so-and-so to make sure they understand that there's no need to share out their portion.

I'd hold that $1200 and mete out the funds as you see fit. If it's a great hunt and you get a good bull, make it rain. If it's a dud and a miserable experience, only tip those who did their best.

tallen702 said:

I don't think there's one standard etiquette when it comes to tipping guides.

For example, when I do a guided pheasant hunt at PVF in PA, we usually tip $30-$40 per hunter because that's what we've seen others do. The max they'll let one guide do is 5 hunters. After that, the group gets too big for one guide to handle properly so they force a split into two groups.

For your moose hunt, I think you plan on the $1200 total and take that in cash and then divvy it up as you see fit. Definitely don't give it to one person it'll never "trickle-down" if you do, I know this from experience being a cook at one point in my life and seeing customers tell the waiter/maître d' to make sure everyone gets a cut only to see the kitchen totally left out at the end of the day. The cook probably isn't expecting a tip, but you'll make their day if they get one. You can also let the guide know you've tipped so-and-so to make sure they understand that there's no need to share out their portion.

I'd hold that $1200 and mete out the funds as you see fit. If it's a great hunt and you get a good bull, make it rain. If it's a dud and a miserable experience, only tip those who did their best.

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I have a different take on this but it could just be my moral compass. I think most outfitters have a select few guides and i don’t believe it’s heavily rotated. It would not serve them well to skim the tip.

At some point the guide is gonna wonder why all the outfitters customers are “cheap bastards”. No one in my hunting group cheats out on tips

I also tip guides 20%. One thing to consider though is sometime you may need to break down the cost of your trip so you are tipping accordingly.

For example, 3 years ago i went to Alaska for 3 days of fishing. It was more or less an all inclusive fishing trip including the lodging and food. We tipped the first mate based on cost of the fishing portion of the trip not the overall cost of the trip that included lodging and food. I dont remember what his tip was, but he did very well for 3 days of work when you consider there were 8 of us on the boat.

StantonCree said:

We tip 20% for guided hunts. We always tip the head of the outfitter to give to his guys. Fishing trips we tip the Captain to give to the mate.

Guides don’t make a ton and their income comes from the tips fir the most part.

Now if your guide is a D bag adjust accordingly. I once went on a goose trip with nothing but cops. The guide spent 4 hours shitting on cops not knowing we were cops. We did still tip 20% because the outfitter did some adjustments to make our trip my enjoyable but i really wished we coulda told him “Everyone in your outfit gets 20% but that guy gets 10%”

My boss did a few day bear hunt in Maine earlier this year. Tip was around $500

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Sucks to have to put up with non sense like that just because you want to shoot some geese.
Seems funny conversation turned to cop bashing on a goose hunt. Usually its about something else. Like decoys, guns-ammo, killing cripples, booze- women where you stayed, what to eat etc. Or even maybe even weather.

You should have just told the guy, enough with the dumb talk we're cops or left.

Doco Overboard said:

Sucks to have to put up with non sense like that just because you want to shoot some geese.
Seems funny conversation turned to cop bashing on a goose hunt. Usually its about something else. Like decoys, guns-ammo, killing cripples, booze- women where you stayed, what to eat etc. Or even maybe even weather.

You should have just told the guy, enough with the dumb talk we're cops or left.

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He was a volunteer FFer so we let him jaw jack, i forget how it started. The outfitter dud is an honest solid in another aspect of the hunt and we did limit out but yeah he shoulda hushed

Thanks, this is helping me and I'm sure others have the same question. It helps to talk things out.
Yes when I was younger I worked as a cook and a chef in catering outfits then later as a meat cutter in a supermarket for 30 plus years...I can count how many times I was tipped on one hand. I could do it all from whole pigs on short notice to fancy filet mignon, lamb, veal and prime rib for Christmas dinner. I'd show them how to cook it, slice it, serve it, what temperature, how much and everything else for a perfect dinner. I enjoyed doing it but the parcel pickup guy would get the tip for putting it in their car.

I do 20% for fishing charters. More if they knock it out of the park.

Good on you for looking into this; there’s no standard tip rate, as the service you receive can be all over the map. I’ll try to respond (with my opinion, no better or worse than anyone else’s) within the text of your separate questions below.

As background, I went on 3 guided moose hunts in Alaska many years ago, before I went to do-it-yourself route and did about 10-12 unguided DIY hunts with friends, or with other hunters I met on wilderness hunting forums. Hunted AK about 15 times in the past 2 decades, and talk with outfitters, guides and transporters every time I go.

“I want to go on a moose hunt and New Foundland seems the most practical destination. I sold off most of my gun collection after retiring and time is creeping up on me. I'm not a rich guy but I have enough cash in my budget for a hunt.

A moose hunt with a reputable guide runs around $5-6000. Do you tip 15-20%? This is where it starts to get detailed.”

Newfoundland has a pretty strong moose population, and in a good moose area a guide may be able to connect the hunter with a moose without having to put out significant effort. If it were me, I would start around 10%, but increase the tip based on the service provided and the amount of effort your guide put out on your behalf. You will be the best judge of that, once the hunt is over.

“Who do you tip? There's place with a main cabin you hunt from. Some places have spike camps on a lake that you fly into and stay the week.
Some places you drive to, some you drive into the area and they pick you up or fly to and they pick you up from the airport.”

There are too many variables to respond to this part – it would be easier to respond once you have booked your hunt and know what type of setup your specific hunt will have. I have tipped guides, packers, pilots, and people who do the logistics/paperwork in town before you fly out. I have also not tipped people on the rare occasions where they didn’t deliver what they committed to deliver.

“So you tip the guide, if its one hunter or two do you split it. The guide might shadow you all day or could drop you off and point you in a direction and wait for a shot or pick you up at dusk.”

Depends again on how much real effort the guide expends. I’m not sure dropping you off and pointing you in a direction actually meets the requirements for guiding a hunter, but on that type of hunt it sure doesn’t sound like they’re working very hard. If you haven’t hunted moose before, you could make all sorts of mistakes that would reduce your chances of bagging a bull, and if the guide isn’t there to stop you from making those mistakes, how much service are they really providing?

“How about if there's a house keeper and/or cook?”

If they do their jobs well and you liked the food, sure. If the accommodations are a mess and you don’t enjoy the food they cook, no.

“The spike camp pilot, the drive from the airport, the outfitter/owner, the butcher, the helpers. Some guides do it all and that would make it simple.”

Again, easier to respond once you book your hunt and know what the setup is. I always tip the pilots that fly me into and out of the bush, but I don’t have any of the other helpers you mention involved on the hunts I do now.

“So 20% would be $1200 and you ride into camp and shoot a moose the first morning near the truck OR you hunt hard all week and have the worst luck ever. Naturally you would vary the amount accordingly.”

Agreed, with the caveat that I would start at 10% and add on based on the actual service provided.

“So do you vary 15-20%, $100-200 a day to the guide, leave $100 for the cook, give $1200 to somebody and let them divvy it up or split it up between who earned it?”

Wait until the end of the hunt to decide how much, and who, to tip. I would not leave the whole tip with one party and ask them to divvy it up; I would make sure to tip the people you felt were deserving, and give it to them yourself. Do not tip the guide each day in any case.

“Does anybody know how it works?”

Tipping guides varies widely based on a lot of factors. Don’t worry too much about what others think or don’t think about your tip amounts. A lot of guides have other jobs throughout the rest of the year; very few rely on guiding as their sole source of income. An amount between 10% and 20% of the original hunt cost will work in most cases. On rare occasions, I have also not tipped anything when the person flat did not provide the service they committed to provide.

i did a private land elk hunt last year, tagged out on the 3rd of 4 days. the owner had a guide of sorts that took me to and from the property from a nearby meeting spot and stayed for most of each day off the property but in a position to spot for me. he also picked up and gutted the two elk i got and took them to the processor. i asked the owner and he said to tip 10% which would be $250 in this case, and i did a little more.

Back in 2008 I went on a deer hunt in IL. Basically the outfitter leased/rented a handful of farms and sold hunts on them. There was 2 farms that had houses/trailers we were able to stay in. He had a handful of stands on each farm and would help retrieve any deer shot. We would meet up after dark and discuss the day's hunt and where might be a decent spot the following day. I think the hunt cost like $1500 back than and we tipped $100 each. He said it wasn't necessary, but we did anyway. IMO extra large tips shouldn't be needed, if they needed or wanted that $ they would charge more for hunts up front but that's just my opinion.

15-20%. We went on a fishing trip this weekend and tipped 40% because they worked their ass off. We always tip well and they works in our favor when re-booking.

When tipping on a charter fishing trip, please remember, the Mate cannot make the fish bite. They actually work harder when fishing sucks.