New law requires an archery license when hunting with archery equipment

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AUGUSTA – Hunters should be aware that beginning Jan. 1, 2017, the Department will begin enforcing the requirement that all hunters who wish to hunt with archery equipment in Maine hold a valid Maine archery hunting license.

The law change will no longer allow exceptions to hunt with archery equipment on the firearms hunting license. Previously an archery license was only required when hunting deer, with bow and arrow during the expanded archery season and special October archery season on deer. Now, bow hunters must hold a valid archery license.

Anyone wishing to obtain an archery hunting license must show proof of having successfully completed a bowhunter education course or show proof of having held an adult archery license in any year after 1979; (Nonresidents who can show proof of having held a valid archery license in another state after 1979 or who can show proof of completion of a bow hunter education course from another state will be able to purchase a Maine archery license).

To find a bowhunter education course in your area, please visit http://www.maine.gov/ifw/education/safety/

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1 Comment

  1. I am a graduate of the Maine college of Archery Knowledge. I attended the course in 2004 and got my certificate. I studied at Mesalonsky High. I didn’t think it necessary then and I don’t think it now. I also hold a lifetime archery, fishing, and hunting license.
    I bet this is a new wrinkle was not a statute, but something cooked up by bureaucrats in Augusta, an item in the Code of Maine Rules. Why was this done? To make it more difficult for individuals to hunt with the bow and arrow? Archery is not particularly dangerous. Why I had to take a course I still don’t know. But I did it.
    What if a 12 year old wants to hunt squirrels or porcupines or woodchucks with the bow? Does he or she have to go to archery college? Typical government trying, having nothing else to do, to run everything!

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