HELLO? Did somebody say, BIG game hunting? When it comes to hunting and fishing it's all about size: the width of the spread, the length of the beard, the height of the tines.

Guys do not go to Saskatchewan in November because they don't care if they shoot a big buck or not.

One of the great secrets of the outfitting business is that there is no correlation between size and cost. For instance, let's say you bought a $5000 moose hunt and you promised your guide a $500 tip for a trophy animal and the hunt is 10 days and 500 divided by 10 is 50. This does not mean you will shoot a 50" moose. There is however a significant relationship between the size of your hunting budget and the type of trip you can afford in the first place.

Interestingly enough, out of the thousands of people I talked to at this year's sport shows, not one person asked me if we have an outfit where customers consistently shoot small deer with cute little racks. Heck, if there was a market for deer with little horns Vermont's Fish & Wildlife department would look like they actually have a plan.

But that's not fair.

There is, a direct correlation between the expanse of a territory, province or region and the potential for quality game. For instance, a birds-eye view of New England reveals the Green Mountains, the White Mountains, the Berkshires, the Allagash, and that big chunk of land between Bangor and Houlton. It is predominantly forested and some areas look pretty remote. Yet, it's also criss-crossed with interstates, train tracks, fields and industrial areas. From that bird's perspective it's pretty obvious that people live down there.

The mid-west is somewhat of an anomaly with its monster whitetails but maybe not. It's still about size. The states of Indiana, Illinois, Iowa and Kansas make up the nation's breadbasket, so named for their production of wheat and corn. FARMLAND! Not the small 500 acre or less family farms of the northeast, farms that cover square mile after square mile, state after state. Though these huge tracts of land are cultivated, they are also sparsely populated.

Have you ever flown over the Rockies on a clear day? The landscape is immense and as far as you can see there are practically no roads! In Canada, they say 80% of the population lives within 100 miles of the US border, an area that accounts for less than 20% of the country's land mass. You see, it's about size and size matters. When you look down at New England, we're all carved up. Even in the most remote regions our tracts of undisturbed territory are hardly comparable to the western states and in relation to Canada & Alaska, we are practically metropolitan.

The bigger the expanse of undisturbed wilderness, the greater the proliferation of wildlife. In large tracts of land not influenced by hunting pressure, animal populations have a much higher percentage of mature members meaning bigger bucks, bigger bulls and even bigger fish.

Of course, genetics and other factors play their roles but the critter simply has to live long enough to get to trophy size and size matters.

So you're thinking, "ah, bigger is better". In some things, yes, but in the weight of your gear being loaded on the floatplane, hardly. Everybody gets the same information, everybody knows that you are only supposed to have 70 pounds of stuff, yet I've been there unloading those extra large duffels, most weighing closer to 100 pounds, the ones that look more like body bags. They always belong to the guy with the cigar who just doesn't get it. Size is also an issue with your carry-on. Ever get behind somebody at an airport's security conveyor who is determined to get that oversized backpack to fit into the x-ray tunnel?
So we've determined that size comes in many sizes; it matters; and it can be either good or bad.

With that in mind, I was thumbing through the current issue of the Safari Club magazine and one of those full-page ads for Africa jumped out at me. You know, it had all these pictures of successful hunters with their various trophies. Well my attention focused in on one with this big guy wearing the safari hat and holding his rifle and shooting sticks standing over this African antelope. But you see, this particular antelope was a duiker. At maturity, these things are only the size of a late season fawn. What's up with that?

Maybe size doesn't matter and Fish & Wildlife does have a plan.