Hunters Asked to Bring Deer to CDFW Check Stations to Check for Chronic Wasting Disease
Press release from the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW):
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) is increasing the scope of its monitoring and testing efforts for Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) in California’s deer and elk herds.[Photo by Terry Kreeger, Wyoming Game and Fish and Chronic Wasting Disease Alliance vis Wikicommons]
“While California has never had a report of CWD, increased testing is needed to establish with a high degree of certainty that there are no deer with CWD in California,” said CDFW Wildlife Veterinarian Brandon Munk. “Keeping this disease out of our state is a top priority, both for wildlife managers and for hunters.”
CWD is always fatal to deer and elk, and is an ongoing concern for hunters and managers throughout the country. Once CWD enters a herd, it is nearly impossible to eradicate. Although there are no known cases of CWD being transferred to humans, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends not consuming meat or organs from any animal that tests positive for CWD.
CDFW’s Wildlife Investigations Laboratory has set an ambitious goal to test 600 deer statewide during this year’s hunting seasons and increasing that number to 2,000 statewide in the upcoming years.
Continued hunter cooperation will be key to achieving the CWD deer testing goals. CDFW will set up check stations during the various deer seasons, and hunters will be asked to bring their deer in for the quick removal of a lymph node for testing. CWD testing of hunter-taken deer is voluntary, and no meat is taken.
Information about specific locations and times of operation of CWD check stations in each of the state’s deer zones and control hunt areas will appear on CDFW’s website. Hunters can also contact regional CDFW offices to get check station schedules. Some offices may also offer onsite deer testing.
Some professional meat processors and butchers throughout the state are also partnering with CDFW to take samples from deer at the hunter’s request. Hunters who may be unable to visit a check station or CDFW regional office for sampling are encouraged to ask their butcher ahead of time if sampling is available at the time of processing.
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“Chronic Wasting Disease” defined – humankind asleep at the wheel. We are the most important, highest ranking, smartest living creature on the planet. We do not think of the planet as Mother Earth. We have had decades of indoctrination in the public fool system, and we will die for the lie.
I saw a doe in Ferndale with a fawn who looked so emaciated and weak. I felt so badly for her. I wondered if she was undernourished. Now from reading this, she most likely may have this disease. It’s true as the creatures of the earth and ocean start perishing it is a sign we humans are setting the stage for our own demise. The Earth is becoming a wasteland.
We are not killing the earth, we are killing human beings. The earth has been spinning for 4 billion years and will spin for another 4 billion, with or without us.Nature will restore itself.We got maybe another 1,000 years at this rate. Think about that for a moment, we are so stupid and ignorant that we will annihilate ourselves in a mere blink of a astrological time frame. Dinosaurs were here for 600 million years…..Us?
Ground Control to Major Tom @8:04,
The year 2025 has been mentioned. Think about that for a moment. Maybe before the sea level rise, we’ll run out of oxygen.
Do you equate “dinosaurs” w/”fossil fuel”, too?
~just sayin..
“Save the planet? we don’t even know how to take care of ourselves; we haven’t learned how to care for one another. we’re gonna save the f*ckin planet? There’s nothing wrong with the planet, the planet is fine, the PEOPLE are f*cked! Compared with the people, the planet is doin’ great. Its been here over 4 billion years…the planet isn’t goin anywhere, we are!! we’re goin away! The planet will shake us off like a bad case of fleas.”
-George Carlin
It took a very short time for the dinosaurs to dissapear. As it will humans and probably most mammals and birds. 1/4 of all the birds in north america have disappeared in just 50 years. You are not paying attention.
What makes you think it’s the first case of CWD in California? Are you familiar with its range and symptoms, or just making an uneducated guess?
I’ve been testing the lymph nodes in my elk for the last several years, luckily with no positives.
CWD, scrapies, mad cow disease, Jacob-Kreuztzfeld, etc are prion diseases. Per https://biology.stackexchange.com/questions/41742/what-is-the-origin-of-prions
“T hus, evidence in part points to a retrogene origin for prions (mediated by a retrovirus, especially since the gene is integrated into the host w/ no introns). They go on to state that two genomic rearrangements spanning hundreds of millions of years serve as the basis for the prion founder gene: A cysteine flanked core element inserted into the ZIP ectodomain, and then the insertion of a spliced, C-truncated ZIP transcript.” Some articles I read indicated that one way prions can be spread is by grazing from ground previously grazed by diseased animals or spread from mites.
Although it is possible that humans have contributed to the spread in domesticated animals simply by moving them from place to place, prion diseases have shown up in places where no such contamination happened. ““We were able to generate a new prion,” Dr. Zabel said. “Maybe this is a spontaneous disease.” and ” As herds migrate along the same route year after year, the supply of prions in the environment may keep increasing.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/26/science/chronic-wasting-disease-deer-elk-prions.html
Maybe, instead of going on guilt binge, maybe humans, with their investigating nature, are going to end up being the saviors of all life on earth that was doomed by the spontaneous genetic mutations. Under any circumstances, being so willing to succumb to excesses of doom is a self fulfilling prophecy- the real Zombie Apocalypse.
We have had two young ones die in our backyard in Ferndale in the past years. The mom always has two and one dies. Always the same, Weight loss and Diarrhea and stays away from the other dear…
CWD takes a while to kill a deer. A fawn still on its mother is not going to be showing symptoms. There are lots of diseases that kill fawns from coccidiosis to viral infections.
Over population of deer herds brings on disease, historically. May this not be happening here. and, the mountain lions seem to be doing their part in keeping the numbers reduced…
~believe me, there’s no “over population” going on. Finally saw a mom and two babies come by. That’s it! Dwindled from six to ten stopping-by on a daily basis in the summertime -just a few years back.. until now, when i’m in gratitude to see the dear.
When the mountain lions used to show up, the deer instantly disappeared. Now, since mountain lions are here all the time, deer are much less common.
“The magnitude of the problem can be understood when we consider that the ratio of deer to mountain lions has apparently declined from an estimated 750:1 in 1950 to about 30:l in 1988. Deer populations cannot meet the needs of the mountain lions and maintain their numbers with the heavy predation that these ratios bring. Kttps://www.fs.fed.us/psw/publications/Popular/mtnlions.html
Canned deer piss tree stand hunters use is the best way it introduce sickness to the area
Check it out
the mountain lions showing up in and around Arcata seem to indicate that they’re having trouble finding food. not enough deer? not enough rabbits?
They don’t like the taste of aluminum & other chemicals that’s all over their forage?
Maybe the forest service can set up hay feeds for them, far away from the freeway. Fat deer, fewer crashes, win win.
They may say this disease isn’t here but around five years ago I went to an unoccupied cabin and found a doe that couldn’t stand, it’s legs would shake and it collapsed.
I told the story once already about how my rifle didn’t work the one time I needed it.
It disturbing the state the deer was in.
If there been a place to take it for inspection I would of, assuming I could lift her into the truck.
As it was I used some rope and unceremoniously dropped her off a steep landslide and hoped whatever was wrong with her wouldn’t spread to other deer.
Rabies and a lot of other animal diseases are endemic to Humboldt. Could have been one of many diseases…
As a hunter, I am very pleased the Department of Fish and Wildlife is starting to check for this deadly disease. Please bring your deer to a check station, if this disease starts to spread we will lose a large number of our deer and elk population. If enough animals are lost we may not be able to hunt for sometime.
In 2013 I saw a flyer at the Miranda Post Office made by CF&G. It was asking for land owners to allow the Biologists to a study of deer that had been infested by the Eurasian tick.
There was a picture on the flyer showing what an infected deer looked like. Well, I had seen many deer that looked that looked like that on my property in Salmon Creek.
I called the Biologist and told them to come on out. Turns out, I was the only property owner in S. Humboldt that responded to the flyer.
I went the Biologist and we tranquilized 2 deer with a tranquilizer gun. We weighed them, put tags in their ears, took tick samples blood samples and put radio collars on them.
The symptoms of an infected deer are massive hair loss and weight loss of 1/3-1/2.
These deer are stunted in growth and many die of hypothermia in the Winter.
The ticks came from private game ranches, mainly from Texas, who had imported deer from Eurasia. It is not the tick, but the virus that lives in the tick.
The virus is transmitted from the mother to the fawns.
There are still many infected deer to this day.
That’s great hooktender, I takes something really unusual with deer to make me worried about them.