James Dorso Wildlife Management Area

James Dorso Wildlife Management Area, also called Ruffingham Meadow, is a 674-acre wildlife refuge in the Maine towns of Searsmont and Montville. It took shape in the 1950s when Bartlett Stream was dammed near Maine State Route 3, flooding an older basin and creating the wetland habitat that defines the area. The refuge is associated with James Dorso, a Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife technician who in the late 1960s helped pioneer the use of nesting boxes in the state to strengthen and stabilize wood duck and other waterfowl populations. It remains significant as a protected wetland and an early example of active waterfowl habitat management in Maine.

Searsmont, Maine · United States