For years now, the Bucks Mills Rod & Gun Club near Bucksport has put on a sumptuous prime rib dinner for Maine Game Wardens, active or retired. It’s quite a hoedown. The wardens get to eat for free. It is the club’s way of showing its appreciation for the hard work and personal sacrifice that […]
outdoors in maine
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Outdoors in Maine: As the grey retreats, time to again explore the outdoors
Those of us who winter over in the South get spoiled in a lot of ways. For one thing, we tend to take the sun for granted. Day after day, that big bright orb comes up in the eastern sky in the morning and then drops below the western horizon late in the day. When […]
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Outdoors in Maine: Controlling coyotes saves deer
Jim Schmidt has been working with coyotes for more than 50 years. As a wildlife specialist for the USDA, he has been involved in coyote damage control throughout the country. He has hunted them, trapped them, snared them, chased them with hounds and chased them on horseback. He has also lived remotely with them for […]
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Outdoors in Maine: When it comes to fiddleheads, timing is everything
Soon it will be time to go fiddleheadin’. For the true gatherer, the first fiddlehead green that pokes through the sandy silt in the lowlands near brooks and streams stirs an inner joy. I count myself among the true gatherers — finding wild things to eat that were not processed by man is a source […]
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Outdoors in Maine: Open-water fishing opening up where ice has melted
Early April fishing has never held much appeal for me. Oh, I have done it. Opening day recollections are of casting a fly line against a snow squall, of frozen fingers and ice-covered rod guides. Of fishless days amid razor-edged winds pushing up whitecaps on frigid lakes whose shorelines were still shrouded with naked, gray […]
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Outdoors in Maine: Dealing with dangerous dogs
Let’s get one thing straight from the start: I love dogs. Sally, probably the last dog I will ever have, needed to be put down a few years back, after she was mauled by my neighbor’s unleashed Saint Bernard. I wrote about it at the time. It was a dreadful experience. An aging English Setter […]
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Outdoors in Maine: The wild turkey outlook
When it comes to Maine sportsmen and wild turkeys, there are two distinct groups: those who hunt ’em and those who hate ’em. Count me among the former. Having hunted them with a shotgun and a bow, it’s beyond me why anyone who loves to hunt is not enjoying this spring opportunity. There is a […]
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Outdoors in Maine: Protecting the deer yards
Deer yards, or deer wintering areas, are a critical component of deer survival in Maine. Nearly 15 years ago, in an article about the status of Maine’s deer yards, I wrote this: As state biologists prepare Maine’s next 15-year plan for deer management, which is due to be approved early this year, deer wintering habitat […]
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Outdoors in Maine: Changing of the guard positive for hunters
Back in the 90s, when I worked as information officer for the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service conducted a Northeast Conference for state information officers like myself. It was booked as an opportunity to share information and promote working relationships between state and federal fish and wildlife […]
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Outdoors in Maine: A gatherer's dilemma
The gathering of wild things for home consumption has always been regarded by my family as one of life’s most basic pleasures. Whether it’s picking fiddlehead greens along a stream bed in late April, picking fall mushrooms to accompany the anticipated November venison back straps, or plucking big, fat juicy black raspberries in late August, […]