With Maine’s regular deer hunting season beginning at 6:44 a.m. Saturday, October 30, many local residents are once again planning to take appropriate safety measures to protect themselves and their family members, as well as pets and domesticated farm animals. These measures include wearing blaze orange hats, vests, and jackets whenever they are outside, placing orange vests on domestic animals, and avoiding walking, trail running, and mountain biking in certain areas.
Hunting is prohibited on Sundays, but is allowed on Veterans Day and Thanksgiving Day. Legal deer hunting begins one half hour before sunrise each morning, and ends one half hour after sunset. This year’s deer hunting season ends 30 minutes after sundown on Saturday, November 27.
Underscoring the importance of wearing blaze orange while outdoors were numerous news media reports in late September, regarding a woman who survived being accidentally shot by a turkey hunter in a wooded area of Leeds, Maine.
In August of this year, the Gorham Town Council enacted several changes to Town firearms regulations, with the most important being the addition of three properties to the list of locations where discharging any firearm is prohibited. These include the Gorham Industrial Park zone and the town-owned Lavoie Pumptrack property near the Middle School. Firearms use is also now prohibited at the Shaw Cherry Hill Preserve on Rt. 25, which is privately owned.
Regarding limitations on how close to a home or business hunters may discharge a firearm, Gorham follows the State of Maine’s firearms regulations, which stipulate that no one may discharge a gun when they are within 300 feet of any building, or cause a bullet or other projectile to pass within 300 feet of a building. Additionally, Gorham prohibits all firearms use within 500 feet of any school property.
The Gorham Police Department recommends that residents should not approach persons who they believe are hunting or target shooting too close to a home, such as to warn them that they are hunting on posted private property.
The police recommend that anyone with concerns about firearms being discharged too close to a residence, or about persons hunting in an unsafe and possibly illegal manner should contact the Gorham Police by phoning 9-1-1 and speaking with a dispatcher at the Regional Communications Center. In some situations the Gorham Police may request assistance from the Maine Game Wardens.
There are a number of town and state designated zones in Gorham where hunting is either restricted or prohibited. These include fourteen zones which are designated as “No Firearms Discharge Zones”; the “Narragansett Game Sanctuary”; and several “Handgun, Shotgun, and Muzzle-loader Restriction Zones”. The Narragansett Game Sanctuary is comprised of about 3,600 acres of woods, fields, and a few residential neighborhoods. It is in the southeastern part of the town, bordering on parts of Scarborough and Westbrook. Originally undeveloped, there are now hundreds of people residing in the Narragansett Sanctuary, a zone where all hunting and trapping is forbidden by state law.
These zones are illustrated on a newly updated map which can be accessed through the town website.
Click here for Gorham’s recently updated firearms ordinance.