This is one area where American fishermen in Canada kick our asses, well, except for people from Washington haha! (When you travel abroad you realize we as Canadians have a bad rep in the tipping department)
When the fish master and senior guides went through the list of guests to see who would get who, we remembered what happened in years past. Crappy tippers never got a shot at the top guides again. Unknown guests from Canada or Washington, or known cheap skates went to the junior guides. I know it’s an awful generalization, but it also seemed true more often than not (That being said some of the best guests were from Washington, but so were a lot of the worst). I’m not saying the way we dealt with it was right, it’s just how it was.
Those who were nice guys and tipped well went straight to the top guides. Their names were looked forward to every year, and you busted your butt and went every extra mile. You always did really, but there was always an extra gear for top guests.
There were a few exceptions, return guests who were so nice and enthusiastic and clearly barely scratched up enough dough to come up, they usually got their guide too through attitude alone, but it was rare.
20 years ago in the Charlottes for two guys on a 3 or 4 days trip, less than $200 CDN was very disappointing. $200 US was ok. $400-500 of either denomination was good, and $1000 was special.
At our lodge the guides and lodge staff were tipped separately.