McLaughlin may soon get his wish, thanks to an innovative new partnership between Wayside and the Maine Chapter of Hunters for the Hungry, a national organization that matches up hunters who harvest more game than they can consume themselves with soup kitchens and food pantries that need proteins of all kinds to feed their patrons.

Students prepare fish cakes that will be apart of a free dinner offered at Parkside Neighborhood Center in Portland, Maine. Photo: Courtesy of Samantha Laster

The Maine Hunters for the Hungry program is one of the few that is administered by the state government. The state department of agriculture and food assistance foots the bill to process the meat, which then gets distributed.

Since 1996, the program has accepted bear, deer and moose donations. This year the total take was 5,500 pounds of game. But a brand new scheme being launched this week will bring sport fishermen into the fold – and hopefully, a lot more fish into soup kitchens that help feed the hungry.

That's a big deal, because despite its importance to a healthful diet, fish can be hard to come by for food assistance organizations like Wayside.

Wayside rescues food and prepares it into meals that are served at community centers and churches throughout the city. Don Morrison, Wayside's operations manager, says his group serves up to nine meals weekly, but fish is on the menu only once or twice monthly. Even with the understanding that these meals are meant to be supplemental to clients' whole diets, Morrison concedes that rate doesn't make a big dent in the USDA recommendation of two servings of fish weekly.

Morrison needs about 100 pounds of fish to produce the 500 meals that Wayside distributes to its lunch and dinner clients, mostly working poor, on any given week. Currently, he relies on periodic fish donations from Sysco, local fishmongers Harbor Fish and Brown Trading Company, and Salt & Sea, a community supported fishery.

"The barriers to rescuing good fish are high because of its short shelf life," says Morrison. Partner wholesale and retail suppliers currently work with Morrison to freeze fish for Wayside that would go off before their next retail opportunity.

"We're getting great fish. But it takes a while to add up to the volume we need," he says, adding that multi-species dishes like fish cakes, casseroles and chowders make it to the menu most frequently.

Morrison hatched a new fish acquisition plan with Jason T. Hall, director of the state's emergency food assistance program: They decided to harness the fish that gets wasted at the state's many fishing derbies.

"There are only a couple of winners at each derby," explains Hall. "But hundreds of fishermen are pulling up and holding onto their three biggest fishes until the end of the day, when the judging takes place." The losing fishes — most often brown and brook trout — are often just discarded.

The pair will be setting up a tent at both the Crystal Lake Ice Fishing Derby in New Gloucester on Jan. 25 and the Sebago Lake Rotary Ice Fishing Derby on Feb. 15-16. Donated fish will be put on ice and brought to Salt & Sea's facility to be filleted.

It's not yet known how much fish these efforts will yield, but Morrison and Hall are hoping to pull in about 150 pounds of fish at Crystal Lake. And they have both heard rumors of upwards of 1,500 pounds of fish going to waste at last year's Sebago Lake event.

"Those are the ones we want to catch," says Morrison, an avid all-season fisherman and most-of-the-time pescetarian.

Morrison also has his eyes on the big ocean fishing competitions that take place throughout the Casco Bay region in the summer.

"Of course, we're not going to get a $10,000 tuna donated," he says, "but getting three or four 200-pound sharks would help feed a lot of people."

Copyright 2014 NPR.

Maine Hunters for the HungryMaine Hunters for the Hungry

An Innovative Plan To Reel In Sport Fishermen To Feed The Hungry