{"id":6694,"date":"2021-05-04T09:48:18","date_gmt":"2021-05-04T13:48:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/?p=6694"},"modified":"2025-08-23T18:52:41","modified_gmt":"2025-08-23T22:52:41","slug":"25-year-game-warden-shares-his-stories","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/2021\/05\/04\/25-year-game-warden-shares-his-stories\/","title":{"rendered":"25 Year Game Warden Shares His Stories"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Maine is proudly the most heavily forested state in the country. The land in Maine is 89 percent forest. The state thrives with wildlife. It is a great treasure and a great responsibility. David Milligan, who was a game warden for 25 years, shared his memories of protecting Maine\u2019s wildlife.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

David Milligan at his Ashland Police Department office.<\/p><\/div>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Milligan became a game warden in 1995. From high school, he wanted that career. He got a degree in environmental science with a major in conservation law enforcement. Afterward, he went to the Maine Criminal Justice Academy and the Advanced Warden Academy.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Maine has only about 100 game wardens. Because game wardens take responsibility for large areas, they adjust their enforcement methods. \u201cYou have that great vast area, but you have certain spots here and there where you know people are going to fish, because that\u2019s where the fishing\u2019s good. So, you\u2019re able to kind of prioritize those areas,\u201d Milligan said.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Game wardens often hide outdoors to watch hunters and fishermen. Regular policemen usually deal with reported crimes. On the other hand, game wardens deal more with crimes they witness. \u201cAs a game warden, we did a lot of surveillance,\u201d Milligan said. \u201cLots of hiding in the bushes and actually watching people. Spying on people while they were fishing.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u201cIt was a blast,\u201d Milligan said. \u201cI would watch somebody fish for like, an hour, and say, \u2018Huh, every fish he catches, he\u2019s throwing back. I guess he\u2019s not going to kill a whole bunch of fish. So, I\u2019m better off to move on to the next person.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u201cSo, a lot of times they would never even know I was there,\u201d Milligan said.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the summer, he mainly managed fishing and watercrafts. \u201cOne nice thing about being a game warden was that every season brought a different thing,\u201d Milligan said.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0One day Milligan monitored a brook. There, no one could fish more than five trout. He saw two people return to their car after fishing. Milligan greeted them and checked how many fish they caught and their licenses. \u201cTheir licenses were non-resident licenses from Vermont. But I saw the Maine plate and saw \u2018There is somebody here from Maine. There must be another person here somewhere,\u2019\u201d Milligan recalled.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Milligan asked about the third person and said he would wait to check him. They got nervous and one offered to drive and retrieve the third person. Milligan insisted on riding along in the front seat. The person looked upset at that but allowed Milligan to come. They drove for a while. \u201cAll of a sudden, I see this man,\u201d Milligan said. \u201cAnd he came out of the bushes on the side of the road, and he\u2019s got this great big plastic bag full of brook trout. He\u2019s got a great big smile on his face. And he\u2019s kind of tiptoeing down like, \u2018Ha! We got away with this!\u2019 Then he walked up to my door, to where I was sitting. And he opened up the door. He saw me in the uniform. Then he was like, \u2018Ah!\u2019 and he threw it over his shoulder into the bushes,\u201d Milligan said, laughing.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>Milligan later found the number of trout in the bag to be about 18.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u201cI think it\u2019s like a game,\u201d Linda Milligan, his wife, said about the job. \u201cThey are trying to catch the people who are trying not to get caught.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Game wardens do even more than protect wildlife. \u201cOur initial mission is to protect inland fisheries and wildlife,\u201d Milligan said. \u201cHowever, there are some things that trump that. And probably the most important thing that we did was search and rescue missions.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0He told a story about a search for some snowmobilers one winter. They were on their way to Fort Kent in deep snow. Instead of the normal snowmobile trails, they took the forest trails. A blizzard came that night. \u201cFour of us responded. Four wardens,\u201d Milligan said. \u201cWhat had happened was they had one of those little beacon things that sent off an SOS to a satellite and gave their GPS location. And we found out that there were three people.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Milligan and the team found their snowmobile tracks. Two wardens went one way and Milligan and another went the other way. \u201cWe ended up finding the guy. His snowmobile broke down. And he was cold, but he did have a little fire going. I don\u2019t know if he would have made it through the whole night. You know, because there wasn\u2019t a lot of firewood really.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The wardens who went the other way found the other two. The two snowmobilers went to get help. The snow was so deep the snowmobilers had to leave their snowmobiles. \u201cThey literally were like, right on end. They (their snow mobiles) sunk right down in the backs and they were stuck,\u201d Milligan said. The snowmobilers were a mile from the plowed road. They decided to crawl in the snow because it was too deep to walk without snowshoes. \u201cLiterally it was like five or six feet of snow,\u201d Milligan said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The two snowmobilers made it onto the road. About a mile down they found the game warden truck. \u201cWell, luckily when we unloaded our snowmobiles about a mile down the road, instead of locking my truck, I said, \u2018Just in case somebody comes out I\u2019m going to keep the truck running, the doors unlocked and the heater on.\u2019 And \u2018lucky for them\u2019 that I did, because they were about froze to death and they went down and they found our truck and got in it to warm up.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u201cBy the time it took us to get all the way back around to where we started, to where those guys were in the truck,\u201d Milligan said, \u201cI think they would have been probably dead or hypothermic. At the least they would have been very hypothermic…. They all survived.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The search and rescue missions were the most meaningful part to Milligan. \u201cI can think of a lot of times, like, in the winter, there would be a snowmobiler missing in the middle of the night. And it\u2019s 30 below zero and you go all night looking for them on the trail and you finally find them. And you know if you didn\u2019t find them, they probably wouldn\u2019t be alive in the morning. And you know you did something right,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Being a game warden required Milligan to always stay on his toes. On the days he didn\u2019t have off, he always had to stay around his phone. That, he said, was one of the hardest things about the job. Linda Milligan said, \u201cIt entails, you know, being willing to go out whenever you get called.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Malcolm Milligan, David Milligan\u2019s son, shared some interesting details about the job. \u201cAll game wardens are trained in case there are attacks on schools or anything like that. So, that way, they can back up the state police. And that\u2019s why they have the semi-automatic rifles, to help with protecting against school shootings,\u201d Malcolm Milligan said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Malcom Milligan also described an issue with moose that game wardens dealt with. Moose sometimes get brain worms. It makes them wander aimlessly on the road. Game wardens drive up and kill such moose to swiftly end their suffering.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u201cSometimes we would have like four feet of snow and the deer would get stuck and he would try to help them get unstuck,\u201d Malcolm Milligan said. \u201cOr, if they fall through the ice, in the water, like on a lake, they actually would lasso the deer and pull it out of the water to save it. So, they were constantly trying to, like, save wildlife.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u201cI wanted to protect the fish and wildlife,\u201d David Milligan said. \u201cThat was my main reason for getting into law enforcement.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Last year, David Milligan retired from the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife. Now, he works for the Ashland Police Department. Since all game wardens train at a police academy, he knows how to do the job. He said he enjoys working in a small town.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Looking back, David Milligan remembered many hard things about working as a game warden. He told the story of how he lost a friend who worked with him. His friend was a pilot for the game warden service. His name was Daryl Gordon. One night, Gordon planned to meet Milligan and some other game wardens who were fishing. The pilot detoured, however, to help a game warden who got stuck. Afterward, Gordon headed home. He got caught in a snow squall and flew toward Milligan\u2019s location to wait it out. Gordon crashed and died on the way. \u201cWho really knows for sure, but we think he couldn\u2019t see the land and he thought he was higher than he was and he crashed. It was very sad,\u201d Milligan said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Milligan shared a story of working with Gordon. Milligan and another warden set up a decoy deer. They set it up so that they could catch illegal night hunters. Gordon flew a plane overhead to watch from the sky. The lights on the plane were kept off to keep the plane out of sight of criminals. A man drove by in a truck and shot the decoy deer. The other warden ran up to the truck, but the truck took off.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Milligan picked up his partner in their vehicle and began the chase. Their tires weren\u2019t studded, and freezing rain covered the ground. \u201cThe guy that shot the deer, not only did he have his studded tires on, but he also had a whole bunch of weight in the back of his truck. So, long story short, I was losing him,\u201d Milligan said. Gordon flew overhead and kept track of the truck, which took the logging roads. Gordon communicated with Milligan\u2019s partner to tell Milligan which turns to take. After about 38 miles, the criminal parked his truck. So, Gordon guided the wardens in.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The wardens found and walked up to the guy who shot the decoy deer. He asked how they caught him. \u201cAt about that time,\u201d Milligan said, \u201cDaryl, our pilot, did a low fly right over the top, put on his landing lights.\u201d Milligan mimicked the loud noise the plane made and laughed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Game wardens do so much to protect the wildlife and the people in the outdoors. The job has many sacrifices. \u201cIt is a life more than a job,\u201d Linda Milligan said. It is not a life for everyone, but it is a gift for those who are meant for it. At the end of his recalling, David Milligan said, \u201cI would encourage anybody who\u2019s interested in it to go for it. It is the greatest adventure that I think a person could ever have, living in Maine.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Maine is proudly the most heavily forested state in the country. The land in Maine is 89 percent forest. The state thrives with wildlife. It is a great treasure and a great responsibility. David Milligan, who was a game warden for 25 years, shared his memories of protecting Maine\u2019s wildlife.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Milligan became a game warden […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":233,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7381],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6694","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archives","et-doesnt-have-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6694","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/233"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6694"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6694\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8254,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6694\/revisions\/8254"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6694"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6694"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6694"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}