Respect landowners

On March 3, a loaded truck went off a woods road near Number 9 Lake located just west of Bridgewater. Accidents of this sort happen in the woods business often and normally only a handful of people would have even known it took place.

In this case, many people know it happened because of what caused this accident.

While bringing a load of woodchips out of the woods, the loaded truck came onto three snowmobiles coming in the same direction as the truck. When the trucker sounded his horn, the snowmobiles stopped in the middle of the road. Rather than hit the snowmobilers, the driver put his truck off the road causing $3,000 of damage to the truck.

The snowmobile operators took off, leaving the trucker on his own, not knowing if he was injured or not.

As an officer in my local club and a former officer of the Maine Snowmobile Association, incidents like this are disturbing. Club members work tirelessly promoting good relations with the thousands of landowners across the state who grant permission to snowmobile clubs to construct and maintain trails for all of us to enjoy.

Actions such as what happened near Number 9 Lake destroy what has taken years to build.

The point of this letter is to get the message to snowmobile operators who don’t pay attention to signs. If a road is posted “NO SNOWMOBILING” that’s what it means. If the landowner has gone to the expense of plowing the road he has done it for a reason. In many cases, clubs have gained access to trails using a section of a plowed road and the truckers know where to be looking for snowmobilers.

Please, don’t destroy what organized snowmobilers have worked so hard to build over the past 30 years. Respect the landowners for the opportunity they allow us.

Dave Steeves

Presque Isle

Be open to tourney

Is the open tournament perfect? Of course not, there are some bugs that need to be worked out which I am sure the Maine Principals’ Association will look into. This format does not teach young people, “it does not matter where you enter the tournament.” (BDN, March 13).

Instead of working to just finish in the top eight, you must now work harder to get into the top four to miss the preliminary rounds. Is it a bad thing to teach your children to aspire to a higher standard?

The facts are these, some schools such as Bangor Christian, are small Class D schools in an area where there are not many other D schools. They must play a variety of Class C and D schools in order to fill their schedule.

Bangor Christian lost six games by seven points or less, a bounce goes their way and they finish 12-6 instead of 6-12, possibly eliminating the need to play a preliminary game or two. There were a number of upsets in the tournament this year, such is the nature of the tournament. I am very proud of the Bangor Christian boys and the never-give-up attitude they exhibited when they were considered heavy underdogs.

We need to teach our young people to be gracious in defeat as well as victory. Don’t judge the open format after just one season. You never know when you will be the 11th seed traveling to a preliminary game, hoping to be around to play another day, possibly at the Bangor Auditorium.

Clark A. Cole

Bangor

TV time for Nokomis

I would just like to know why the TV announcers for the Eastern Maine Class A tourney basketball games hype up the favored team.

When Nokomis played Cony, the announcers were always saying what Cony was doing right and how far ahead Cony was. But when Nokomis took the lead they rarely mentioned the score at all, and when they did it was to say that Cony was narrowing the lead. What does a team have to do to be considered a contender?

Both of these teams went into this game with the same record of 20-0, yet Nokomis wasn’t recognized for their incredible efforts until they beat Cony, and then the announcers were stunned.

To prove this point further, WABI-TV ran highlights of a Cony player’s other interests during halftime. Why wasn’t Nokomis given the same airtime?

I hope now everyone will realize that any team that makes it to the tournament can walk away with the title, even if they are considered the underdog. And all the teams deserve the same respect .

Congratulations Nokomis Warriors.

Lisa Ballard

Hartland

No Bananas for UM

Recently, I had the pleasure of attending the America East Conference basketball championship series in Newark, Del. Congratulations to coach John Giannini and his coaching staff and to the University of Maine men’s basketball team who represented the college and the state of Maine in fine fashion.

The fans that made the long trip to Delaware were rewarded for their efforts with two great performances by the Black Bears, an overtime win over conference rival Boston University and a near upset of the conference champions Hofstra in the semifinal game.

Obviously lacking, however, at the tournament, was support for the team by the University of Maine. Maine was one of the four top seeds of the tournament. The other top seeds were well represented by their schools in the form of pep bands, cheerleaders, mascots, and dance teams.

Unfortunately, the Maine team had no support groups in attendance. Their absence was obviously lacking. Maine has one of the best pep bands in the country and a great cheering squad.

Needless to say our mascot, Bananas, is a great source of entertainment and a real crowd pleaser at all of the Maine sports events.

Yes, a trip such as this is an expense for the university, however, representation of this type at a tournament of this caliber should be a priority for the athletic department. After all the athletes’ efforts after a season such as the men’s basketball team had this year should be rewarded and supported by their university.

Hopefully, Maine athletic department officials will consider making an effort to see that this type of oversight does not occur in the future.

Dottie Cerbone

Brewer

Benefits of tradtion

I have been involved in the Maine Youth Field Days program since it began two years ago. I can tell you, it’s a great way for kids and their parents to come and experience [briefly] the traditions of hunting, target shooting, fishing, archery, trapping, outdoors safety, camping and survival, and riding.

We at York County Fish & Game Association of Lyman hosted the first Maine field day which was modeled after a program in Pennsylvania. It’s a great event and was attended by many single-parent families. At our first event, many two-parent families attended and there was so much work to do that many fathers or mothers volunteered to do things like registration or being a group leader for the day. It is one heck of a day, but the great thing is that many parents were looking for just such an experience for their kids.

I am a board member of YCF&G and former chair of the black powder shooting committee. I am also president of the newly formed Maine Muzzleloading Sports Association. One of the goals in our mission statement is to encourage the black powder community to participate in youth field days as they spread around the state.

I manage the black powder shooting event at youth field days held in Lyman. At our first event, 195 kids got to shoot a traditional caplock muzzle-loaded rifle.

Last year, we gave them a little treat that we were sure they had never experienced. Many of the kids had never shot a gun of any kind. A few of the kids had shot some kind of a gun: BB, .22, dad’s hunting rifle, and a few had fired their dad’s modern inline muzzleloader.

None had shot a flintlock rifle, that’s right, one of them “Davy Crockett smokin’ guns,” one of the youths called them! I’ll bet there hasn’t been an event in the history of the state of Maine when 145 kids got to shoot a genuine flintlock long rifle.

It was thrilling for the parents as well as the shooting instructors. I really believe that youth field days must be an integral part of the traditional sporting communities future. As they spread around the state, sporting clubs of all denominations must jump aboard to help preserve our outdoors traditions.

What you can do to help other clubs sponsoring youth field days around the state is to get in touch with Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife’s field days coordinator to learn where these events are proposed and help spread the word. Bring the kids to Maine Youth Field Days, it’s a great time and a opportunity for many single-parent families to expose their kids to our traditional sports.

Ed Stubbs

Waterboro

Leave traps home

Loren Ritchie (BDN, March 13) would have readers believe that the Conibear trap is “quick and humane.” While there probably will never be agreement between those who trap and those in the majority who think it is a cruel and unnecessary practice, a couple of comments on his letter must be made.

First, the Conibear does not always bring a quick death. Depending on how the animal approaches the trap, it can lead to long and excruciating suffering.

There was one news report of a dog that tripped a Conibear set on his family’s property. The dog managed to crawl about 1,800 feet, while choking, to die on the front porch in front of the children who tried desperately to free him.

Second, trappers do the public no service by killing fishers, the only predator fast and wily enough to prey on porcupines. Anyone who has had his trees girdled or his pets full of quills would like to keep that population in check.

Couldn’t Mr. Richie enjoy those mountaintop outings with his son and leave the traps home?

Cherie Mason

Sunset

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