4. Warden's certificate. The A game warden shall immediately investigate the case an incident under this section as soon as possible and, if he the game warden is satisfied that the deer or other wild animal was taken as provided in this section, he shall give the person who killed the deer or other wild animal a certificate of his finding in the matter. The certificate that entitles the person to the ownership of the carcass or carcasses, to be possessed and consumed only within the immediate family of the owner of the crops or other person designated in subsection 1 or the person who killed the deer or other wild animal.

Sec. 3. 12 MRSA §7505, sub-§4 is enacted to read:

4.__Failure to report the wounding, taking or killing of a nuisance wild animal or properly care for carcass.__A person is guilty of:

A.__Failure to report the wounding, taking or killing of a wild animal if that person wounds, takes or kills a wild animal under section 7501 or 7502 and fails to report all the facts relative to the incident to the Maine Warden Service within 12 hours; and

B.__Failure to care for the carcass and meat of a wild animal if that person kills a wild animal pursuant to section 7501 or 7502 and fails to immediately and properly dress the carcass and care for the meat to prevent spoilage.

SUMMARY

This bill makes several changes to the section of law that deals with nuisance animals in general and depredation permits for landowners, farmers and orchard owners. It adds domestic birds to the provision that allows a person to kill any wild animal found attacking or wounding that person's domestic animals or destroying that person's property.

The bill clarifies that all types of grasses are excluded from the provision that allows an owner of orchards or growing crops to kill wild animals that are doing substantial damage to that person's orchards or crops and that the wild animal must be in the act of doing the damage.

In addition, the bill requires that when an orchard owner or landowner employs someone outside of the immediate family to kill wild animals under the provisions of this law that written permission to employ such a person must be obtained from a game warden.

It changes the reference from a game warden to the Maine Warden Service under the reporting requirements so that if a game warden can not be contacted, a person may call one of the regional headquarters instead.

It clarifies that in all cases of deer, bear or moose being killed, a person must immediately and properly dress the carcass and care for the meat to prevent spoilage.

Finally, the bill prohibits failing to report or properly care for the carcass and meat of a wild animal killed pursuant to this law.