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Hares are Dwindling in Southern Maine

January 12, 2010 - When I was growing up in Windsor in the 1950s and 1960s, varying-hare populations had skyrocketed in rural areas in the bottom third of Maine, thanks to dairy and subsistence farms going out of business and creating ideal hare habitat.

Back then, abandoned pastures and hayfields reverted to secondary growth of alders, rubus and leatherleaf – great for the game species Maine natives like me called "rabbits." Woodcutters also helped create habitat with myriad small clear-cuts, a popular cutting practice at the time.

In the 1950s, the state allowed hunters to shoot four rabbits per day from Oct. 1 to March 31, and the possession limit was eight – just like today. The bag limits and season have not changed in my lifetime.

Which surprises me, and here's why:

These days, rabbit populations in southern, central and mid-coast Maine have plummeted because in the 1970s and 1980s that perfect secondary growth in the bottom third of the state had started turning into primary forests, great for turkeys but bad for rabbits and also for ruffed grouse.

Until 23 years ago, I would hunt on one morning every winter with the reasonable expectation of shooting one or two rabbits with a .22 rimfire instead of a shotgun so as not to destroy meat. Each year, these one or two hares would become the main ingredient for a gourmet evening meal, using an ancient, honorable recipe called jugged hare. The term "jugged" comes from the verb "to jug," meaning to stew slowly in liquid.

At our home, a green veggie for color, brandied carrots for more color, crusty, homemade French bread and a good, heavy French red wine such as Pomerol or St. Emilion often accompany the main dish. The meal cries out for candlelight, china and crystal wine glasses – a real production.

I remember the exact year and day that shooting a rabbit gave me a problem – 1987. I was living in a log house then, tucked in the woods in ideal rabbit cover.

On that day 23 years ago, a morning and early afternoon of hunting had produced zero rabbit sightings and darned few tracks, and around 1 p.m. freezing rain started to fall. That discouraged me enough to quit the hunt.

After getting back home, I was talking on the phone when a hare hopped down the driveway – time to poke the .22 out the door and bang. It seemed so easy, but I had hunted six hours prior to the shot.

These days, a morning in a rabbit cover often ends in a skunking, but boneless, skinless chicken thighs work as an OK substitute.

Nothing shows how the current rabbit-hunting scene has changed in central, southern and mid-coast Maine better than the following observation.

During my youth, it seemed every fourth house in my hometown had a rabbit hound or two tied out back, typical in this entire region. A plentiful rabbit population translated into lots of folks getting into the sport.

Today I can count the number of rabbit-dog owners I know on one hand. Tough hunting discourages folks from investing in hounds.

Widespread primary forests in the rural bottom third of the state have hurt hare populations, but this region has small pockets of secondary growth where animals thrive – honey holes difficult to find.

These islands of rabbit habitat often separated by miles of primary forest cause a logistical problem for hare populations, too. This species seldom wanders for more than 1,000 yards in its home territory, effectively making sure that if hunters or coyotes clean out rabbits in an island of cover, that spot may not have other ones move in to replenish it – period.

One irrefutable difficulty facing the Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife does no favors to rabbit populations in the bottom third of Maine. IFW lacks funds and manpower to manage some game species properly, and varying hares and ruffed grouse jump to mind as ignored species. However, that's no criticism because the limited biologists in the agency have enough problems keeping up with deer, bear and moose.

Clearly, hunting 50 years ago did not affect the rabbit population in this part of Maine, but today hunting – and particularly coyotes – can strain the resource because of dwindling habitat. A solution might be live trapping of rabbits and moving them to empty covers where no hares exist.

The rabbit population in Maine's bottom third has dropped to such low levels that folks with hounds often head north where woodcutting practices have created widespread habitat.

Guides in the north country even advertise for rabbit hunters, surprising me. Few people hired a rabbit-hunting guide circa 1965, but a hare scarcity in the bottom third of Maine and in southern New England in general has generated a growing business in northern Maine.

KEN ALLEN, Portland Press Herald, January 9, 2010


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