Some wise old sage once said something to the effect that “politics is the art of the possible.”

A good demonstration of this adage is the soon-to-be-enacted legislation simplifying Maine’s law that regulates legal hunting hours.

This fall, thanks to LD 1083, An Act to Encourage Hunting by Simplifying Hunting Laws, hunting of all game birds and game animals must end at sunset.

Contrast this with the previously confusing hodgepodge of hunting-hour regulations. Last fall, for example, grouse hunting ended at sunset. If you were a deer hunter, your rifle had better be unloaded by 15 minutes after sunset or you were guility of “twilight hunting.” Moose hunters, on the other hand, had only until sunset to bag their big critter.

A hunter almost needed to bring along F. Lee Bailey and an official NASCAR timer to stay within the law.

This recent and seemingly common sense change in Maine’s legal hunting hours did not come about easily. In fact, its acrimonious, checkerboard evolution is worthy of a quick review. It is instructive.

There was a day not so long ago that all hunting ended at sunset, but well-intended politicians and Fish and Wildlife Department policymakers monkeyed with the legal hunt hours in attempts to promote safer hunting.

Previous attempts by the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine (SAM) and other sportsmen’s lobbies to return to the half-hour-after-sunset rule were repeatedly thwarted by testimony from Fish and Wildlife officials, who stoutly held their ground arguing hunter safety. Spokesmen for the Maine Warden Service showed videos at legislative hearings. The videos demonstrated the relationship between low light conditions and difficulty in target identification.

The 15 minutes after sunset rule for deer hunters was a typical “Augusta solution,” a silly compromise and political sop that did little for the hunter and only served to confuse an already confusing situation.

Now that this hunting hour debate is all behind us and common sense has at long last prevailed, here are a couple of points that solons and sportsmen might want to chew on.

Sportsmen. You know what’s coming. The freedom to hunt until dusk and pursue game during that magical half hour carries with it greater risk

and responsibility. In the days before mandatory hunter orange, Maine’s hunt fatality

statistics revealed an indisputable connection between low light conditions and hunting accidents. While the wearing of hunter orange, lessens the risk of target identification in low light, there remains a

very real safety issue. As sportsmen, we need to remain vigilant and mindful of the risk while afield and conduct ourselves

accordingly. This state’s hunting safety record has been exemplary during the past few falls. We need to keep it that way.

As for Augusta policymakers and politicians, this is a textbook illustration of the good you can do, even if it simply involves undoing bad legislation or misguided policy that you created in the first place. We are told that credit for this simplified hunting-hour regulation belongs to SAM’s Pickering Commission (for pushing the legislation), and to our new DIF&W leadership – Commissioner Dan Martin and Deputy Commissioner Paul Jacques. Most sportsmen will applaud their actions.

Looking down the road, all of this could be a good omen, the beginning of an era of change led by an Augusta leadership that embraces simpler hunting and fishing laws and expanded opportunity for sportsmen. Keep your fingers crossed.

V. Paul Reynolds is editor of the Northwoods Sporting Journal.He is also a Maine Guide, co-host of a weekly radio program “Maine Outdoors” heard Sundays at 7 p.m. on The Voice of Maine News-Talk Network (WVOM-FM 103.9, WCME-FM 96.7) and former information officer for the Maine Dept. of Fish and Wildlife. His e-mail address is paul@sportingjournal.com.

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