Controversial quotes from Maine sportsmen and others

coyote DIF&W photoFor many years I’ve been writing a monthly Quotable Sportsman column for The Maine Sportsman. These quotes are often controversial, usually informative, and sometimes entertaining. Occasionally in this Outdoor News column I’m going to look back and give you some of those quotes.

While hunting, fishing, camping and other venerable outdoor recreation activities will continue to contribute to Maine’s rural economy, they show little growth potential.

Maine Center for Economic Policy report authored by David Vail, July 21, 2010.

SAM’s main objection to LD 798 is that Sunday hunting has become such a wedge issue that divides sportsmen and landowners.

David Trahan, Executive Director of the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine testifying against a bill to permit night hunting of coyotes on Sunday. May, 2013.

One aspect of the Maine warden’s job… is that they really are off-road police officers. Some readers are always surprised to learn that our wardens are full-fledged cops.

Maine novelist Paul Doiron, who’s fictional accounts of Maine game wardens are very popular. May 2, 2013.

As a state wildlife biologist in Greenville, I was directed by supervisors in Augusta to spread wolf urine on Route 201 to repel moose. The project was the most inane of my 33-year wildlife career. It then rained for a week, transforming a legislator’s harebrained wildlife idea into a complete debacle. The state had literally peed public money into the wind.

Ron Joseph, retired federal wildlife biologist. September 10, 2010.

I shaved my hair off and I’m blaming turkeys. I want them gone. I want my hair back.

Representative Craig Hickman, an organic farmer who was finding ticks in his hair and blamed it on turkeys. February 12, 2013

He bought me my own gun for a wedding present – a .308 Ruger Model 77 Lightweight Bolt Action Rifle.

Former State Senator Anne Haskell who married state retiree Lou Haskell in 2004. Ann served on the legislature’s IFW Committee and shot a moose in 2012. April, 2013.

The coyote is displaying no fear of humans and being seen during daylight hours, which is of particular concern… Because of the threat the coyote poses to the public, police have no alternative but to safely dispatch the animal when we come in contact with it.

Houlton Police Chief Butch Asselin. January 1, 2013.

She said her 14-year-old son wanted to make sure he had enough to stock his tree stand for hunting season.

Julie McAllister, loading up on Twinkies at the Hostess Bakery outlet in Waterville, after learning the company was closing all of its facilities across the country. November 17, 2012.

 

I’ll never forget looking up and seeing a jaw full of teeth coming at me.

Bill Robinson, Machias guide, after being bitten on the right arm by a coyote while hunting and calling turkeys.May 2, 2012.

Why do you folks not respect the beauty and loveliness of your state? Clean up your dwellings; your trash and messy areas are showing.

Gayla Stewart, Sioux Falls, South Dakota, in a letter to the editor about North Woods Law, an Animal Planet series featuring Maine game wardens. April 26, 2012.

George Smith

About George Smith

George stepped down at the end of 2010 after 18 years as the executive director of the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine to write full time. He writes a weekly editorial page column in the Kennebec Journal and Waterville Morning Sentinel, a weekly travel column in those same newspapers (with his wife Linda), monthly columns in The Maine Sportsman magazine, two outdoor news blogs (one on his website, georgesmithmaine.com, and one on the website of the Bangor Daily News), and special columns for many publications and newsletters. Islandport Press published a book of George's favorite columns, "A Life Lived Outdoors" in 2014. In 2014, George also won a Maine Press Association award for writing the state's bet sports blog. In 2016, Down East Books published George's book, Maine Sporting Camps, and Islandport Press published George and his wife Linda's travel book, Take It From ME, about their favorite Maine inns and restaurants.