HARRISBURG - A study of Pennsylvania hunting-related accidents released today concluded that fall turkey hunters had the greatest rate of accidental shootings while grouse hunters had the best safety record.

Most self-inflicted wounds were attributed to poor hunting skills, but when one person shot another, it was almost always a result of bad judgment, according to a review of incidents from a 12-year period published in the March issue of The Journal of Trauma: Injury, Infection and Critical Care.

Injuries most commonly occurred on the first day of hunting season for all six types of game studied, with significant spikes also found on the second day of each season and on subsequent Saturdays.

The study's recommendations included better supervision and training for young hunters, particularly in handling firearms, since those under 20 were the most likely to be injured.

For turkey hunters, the study also endorsed better safety instruction and the reintroduction of mandatory blaze-orange clothing.

Turkey hunters are at greater risk because they generally remain stationary and use turkey calls to lure their quarry, prompting other hunters to mistake them for game, researchers said.

Although it is a violation of game law to "stalk" a turkey, about three-fourths of shooting incidents during turkey season involved circumstances that suggested to the researchers that the shooter may have been stalking and shooting based on the sound of a turkey call.

Penn State College of Medicine health-evaluation sciences professor Gene Lengerich and Penn State physician graduate student Joseph Smith led the examination of 1,345 shootings from 1987 to 1999 that were connected to hunting deer, pheasant, grouse, rabbit, squirrel, fall turkeys or spring turkeys.

"The rate of injuries from hunting are dramatically different depending upon who's hunting and what's being hunted. There are ways that the injury rate can be reduced," Lengerich said Wednesday.

Among shooting victims, deer hunters were the most likely to die as a result, and grouse hunters were most likely to survive.

Pennsylvania Game Commission spokesman Jerry Feaser noted that overall hunting-related shootings in the state have been falling in recent years as the agency has aggressively pursued safety initiatives.

Feaser disputed the report's suggestion that blaze-orange clothing would necessarily improve turkey hunters' safety.

"Black, blue, red and white- those are the colors in a turkey's head. And there are some who believe the color bright-orange sometimes is mistaken for some of those colors," he said.