Deer kill numbers were expected to be down from last year, but as the firearms hunting season came to an end Saturday, the figures were looking even lower than anticipated.

“We expected deer numbers to be down from last year, which was one of the best years in 20 years,” Maine Game Warden spokesman Mark Latti said Saturday. “Mainly because of the severe winter we had last year, we knew there wouldn’t be as many deer available to hunters.”

Final deer kill figures won’t be in for another couple of weeks when the muzzle loading and archery seasons are complete. But reports from tagging stations and game wardens around the state show a significant decrease in kill numbers for this year.

“We keep saying it’s going to pick up but it hasn’t,” said Phil Phillips of Willy’s Sport Shop on Saturday. The Ellsworth tagging station recorded 52 bucks and five does during this year’s firearm season.

“We’re down 30 to 40 percent this year over years past,” Phillips said.

The owner of the Pine Tree Store at Grand Lake Stream Plantation reported even lower numbers.

“It’s gloom and doom out here,” Kurt Cressey said. “Last year we tagged an all-time season high 37 deer. This year we’ve only tagged eight.”

The reason for such low kill numbers can be attributed to a number of things, according to hunters and wardens.

Weather conditions had a lot to do with it, said Ray Levesque of Bishop’s Store Inc. in Jackman, which saw about a 15 percent decrease in kill numbers over 2002.

“We’re used to having snow up here and we haven’t had any to speak of [this year],” he said. Levesque also noted that border towns have seen a dramatic decrease in the number of hunters since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

“There are very few Canadian hunters coming across the border,” Levesque said, referring to the more stringent homeland security measures in place.

A rough and extended winter last year made for poor breeding conditions for the deer population, and weather conditions for November this year have been abnormal, according to Latti.

With normal hunting conditions – less rain, colder weather and at least a ground-covering snowfall – Latti said the kill was anticipated to be around 35,800.

“Without things that aid hunters, like snowfall, we expect the kill to be below that,” he said. Last year’s kill brought in more than 38,000 deer, according to the spokesman.

On a more positive note, the conditions may also have contributed to a decrease in hunting-related injuries, despite concerns that new legislation allowing hunters an additional half hour after sunset to hunt deer would lead to more injuries.

With more than 200,000 licensed hunters in the state, there have been only five shooting-related accidents this year – four of which came during deer season – and none were fatal. Of the five, three were self-inflicted shooting accidents, Latti said.

“When you look back at this, unfortunately it always seems like the majority of the injuries can be avoided by following simple rules of firearm safety,” he said. “Certainly any time when you have a shooting-related injury, there is the potential for it to be fatal. But hunting-related fatalities are becoming very rare, where it doesn’t happen every year.”

This is in stark contrast to the 1940s and 1950s, when Maine would see upward of 10 or 15 hunting fatalities a year, Latti said.

The most recent accident came on Saturday when Wayne Millet, 25, of Oxford, accidentally shot himself in the foot while talking to his hunting partner.

“Somehow the gun went off and shot through his right foot,” Game Warden Christl Theriault said Saturday. “It wasn’t real severe.” Millet was able to walk out of the woods and was driven to nearby Stephens Memorial Hospital in Norway by his hunting partner.

On opening day of the deer season, Dustin Freeman of Gardiner was grazed in the hip when his 18-year-old brother fired at a deer that jumped from the brush. Freeman was treated at a hospital and released.

Earlier this month, a hunter from Lincoln shot off his right pinkie finger when he fell onto some brush and his shotgun went off as he tried to pick it up.

Injuries may have been fewer, but there were still a significant number of hunters who got lost – some for only an hour or two, while a few spent a night in the woods, Latti said.

The warden service doesn’t keep track of the number of lost hunters, but Latti said that between hunters, hikers and children, they conduct anywhere from three to six searches per week.

“People are getting better at letting people know where they’re going and when they expect to get back,” the spokesman said. The warden service also has refined its search methods, he said.

As the law enforcement arm of the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, the warden service must also contend with poachers, an ongoing problem in Maine for years.

“There’s a percentage of people out there who don’t want to abide by the laws and who don’t feel that the laws pertain to them. That’s why we have to have people patrolling out there every day,” Latti said. “As long as there’s deer in Maine I’m sure there will be poaching.”

As a resource to the state, deer are valued by both hunters and wildlife watchers, Latti said. Overall, hunting has an economic impact of $495 million in Maine, he said.

“Game wardens are out there trying to protect this resource and I think most everybody feels that they do an excellent job,” Latti said.

Based on the number of licenses sold, Maine has between 205,000 and 215,000 hunters. While other states are finding it difficult to bring in out-of-state hunters, Maine has been the opposite. The number of out-of-state hunting licenses sold has increased slowly over the last few years, to approximately 40,000.

The sport has strong roots in Maine and still remains one of the safest, according to Latti.

“November in Maine means deer season, and it’s a tradition for a lot of people,” he said.