Preserving our Natural Resources and Traditional Recreational Activities

  • Completion of the Big Game Planning Process, setting the stage for big game management for the next ten years of moose, bear, white-tailed deer and wild turkey.
  • Initiation of a statewide Breeding and Wintering Bird Atlas involving thousands of citizen scientist volunteers to document bird populations across the state. 
  • Creating Economic Opportunity for Shellfish Harvesters using a new biotoxin testing technique for shellfish that allows more targeted shellfish closures. This new testing methodology has also been critically important in Maine's effort to successfully deal with emerging biotoxin threats.  
  • Rebuilding the Scallop Fishery through forward-looking management approach and sacrifices of Maine's commercial scallop harvesters to comply with those measures.
  • Maine State Parks have set several attendance records, attracting a record 2.87 million visitors in 2016, breaking the annual attendance record set in 2015. The 2015 record had been the highest since 1985, with just over 2.6 million visitors.