THE LAND OF GIANTS
Memories at Garden
River Outfitters
 Editor’s
note: For five days, I watched white-tailed bucks around
me that would score from 110 to 130 points on Boone
& Crockett Scale from my stand with my black-powder
gun. I saw one buck that would have weighed well over
300 pounds, and every day I had a chance to take a buck
bigger than any I’d seen in my home state of Alabama.
But, when you’re hunting in the land of monsters,
near Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, in western Canada where
hunters regularly take 140 and 150 B&C bucks, you
don’t want to pull the trigger on a lesser buck.
Let’s talk to some other people who have hunted
with the same outfitters. The Mo of the Monsters is
Maurice Heisler, known to everyone as Mo, who owns Garden
River Outfitters, and has 200,000 acres of crown land,
30-miles north of Prince Albert. For 15 years, Mo has
taken hunters into the bush to take the Saskatchewan
monsters.
QUESTION: What’s the biggest
buck you’ve ever seen on this land?
MO: One of my returning hunters, Billy Brooks, took
a deer that weighed  409
pounds. Even though this buck was big, he didn’t
score very well, only scoring 135, because he was on
the down cycle of his life. This buck had 12 or 13 points
and was really heavy- antlered and massive, but, his
points were short. Up until three or four years ago,
the majority of our deer were dying of old age, but
in recent years, we’ve seen signs of wolves killing
a lot of our older-age-class bucks. The wolves have
always been here, but more of them seem to be coming
down from north of here. I’m afraid this region
is becoming overpopulated with wolves.
QUESTION: Can hunters take the wolves?
MO: No, only the trappers can take the wolves.
QUESTION: What’s the weather
normally like here?
MO: We very rarely get below zero-degrees Fahrenheit
in the month of November. Occasionally, the temperature
will drop below zero, but up until 10 years ago, the
November temperatures often were 30 to 40 degrees below
zero. Today in November, 2005, it was only 4 degree
below zero, which is generally the average. However,
I always tell my hunters to dress warm.
 QUESTION:
What’s one of your most-memorable deer taken here
at the lodge?
MO: I guess that would be a deer taken by Jimmy Jurch
from New Jersey, who took a deer a few years ago that
scored 204 B&C. Nick Karas, a writer for Newsday
in New York City, had sat in the same stand before Jimmy.
Although Nick had sat in the same stand the week before
and saw the same deer, he never had an opportunity to
take him. When Jimmy Jurch came in the following week,
he took that big buck, and we had quite a celebration.
Jimmy has hunted with me for 10 years, but after he
took that big, solid buck, he never got another one
as big or better. John Grando from New York, took a
buck that scored 188 on the B&C scale. At 3:00 p.m.
on a Saturday. I was on the road taking some of the
other hunters back to their hotel. When one of the hunters
I was taking back heard about the big deer John took,
he said, “Stop the bus, and take me back. I’m
staying another week.” And he did.
 QUESTION:
Can you say that once the hunters come here they rarely
go somewhere else to hunt?
MO: Once a hunter comes to this lodge to hunt, most
of our hunters return year after year to have an opportunity
to hunt with us. I have two hunters at the lodge now,
who have hunted with us for the past two years. Most
of the time, when people come to this lodge, they want
to bring their friends back with them the following
year, and so we rarely have to advertise. Most of the
hunters who hunt with me now, have been hunting here
for 10 to 14 years.
For more information on Garden River Outfitters, contact
Mo at (306) 978-2307, or you can write to him at Box
929, Martinsville, Saskatchewan, SOK-2TO.
To learn more about Black Powder Products, Inc. (BPI),
the makers of CVA, Winchester and New Frontier Muzzleloading
guns and accessories, call (770) 449-4687, or visit
www.bpiguns.com
TOMORROW: YOU CAN HUNT BEAR TOO
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