The state Task Force on the Decline of Nonresident Hunters in Maine has finished its report. Its charge was to examine the issue of why Maine is losing its nonresident hunters at a rate that far surpasses the national decline in hunting license sales. In the past decade, the sale of nonresident hunting licenses in Maine has spiraled downward.

This is a serious issue, and a complex one in some respects. Traditionally, the sale of Nonresident Big Game Licenses has been a major source of revenue for the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife. Equally important, nonresident big game hunters have pumped significant dollars into the rest of Maine’s economy.

As far as it goes, the task force did a pretty good job. It’s list of recommended changes make sense. For example, doing away with Maine’s residents-only-day for deer hunters is a change that is long overdue. It is discriminatory on its face, and custom made to turn off nonresident hunters. But, like other efforts to accommodate nonresident hunters, this throwback to a more provincial Maine can’t seem to survive political opposition in the legislative process.

To its credit, the task force acknowledges that creating a more attractive climate for nonresident customers is tied to more aggressive, thoughtful marketing. This is not a new discovery, however. Over the years, Maine’s Office of Tourism, which seems to have lobster on the brain, has given mostly lip service when it comes to promoting Maine’s fishing and hunting opportunities. If the task force report serves as a catalyst for meaningful change in this area, it will be for the better and long overdue.

Although good marketing and demographic data is always helpful, nonresident hunters are already telling us, in no uncertain terms, why they are staying away: 1) No Sunday hunting, and 2) a scarcity of deer in the North Woods. Unfortunately, the task force report seems to gloss over these two critical issues.

Included in the task force’s list of recommended changes is this one: “Remove wild turkeys from the Big Game License category and re-categorize as Small Game.” According to task force member, Tenley Bennett, the idea is to expand the hunter opportunity base by making it more affordable for nonresident hunters to hunt turkey in Maine. Currently, a nonresident hunter must pay $114.00 for a Big Game License and $54 for a turkey permit. Bennett points out that “reclassifying” the wild turkey as small game would allow the nonresident to hunt turkeys for a lot less money on a three-day nonresident Small Game License.

From the state turkey hunting community, there is already some pushback on this suggestion. Outdoor writer and veteran southern Maine turkey guide, Stu Bristol, doesn’t like this idea at all. Bristol, a former Vermont game warden, was on the ground floor of Maine’s wild turkey introduction program. He strongly believes that designating wild turkeys as small game is a step backwards, a downgrade of the wild turkey that would diminish the stature and protection of this tough, elusive game bird. He says further that many of his hunters consider a turkey to be a tougher, more worthy woods adversary than the whitetail deer!

Bristol would like to see the department attract more Maine nonresident turkey hunters with more creative “tweaking” of the hunting regulations pertaining to wild turkeys and more aggressive marketing of the wild turkey as a highly prized big game quarry. As an example, Bristol suggests allowing a licensed nonresident big game hunter the option of taking one spring gobbler on a Big Game License and, perhaps, one of either sex in the fall. He also believes that the fall turkey season is far to abbreviated.

The findings of the task force are now in the hands of the Fish and Wildlife Department and the Legislative Fish and Wildlife Committee. Hopefully, neither of these policymakers will reject sensible, useful changes just because they have been proven politically unpopular. It will take leadership and bold strokes if Maine is ever going to salvage its lost customer base of disenfranchised nonresident hunters.

The author 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, WQVM-FM 101.3) and former information officer for the Maine Dept. of Fish and Wildlife. His e-mail address is [email protected] and his new book is “A Maine Deer Hunter’s Logbook.”