CWD DETECTED IN ALABAMA DEER; HELP PREVENT SPREAD TO GEORGIA

C.Killmaster

Georgia Deer Biologist
Following is a news release from the Georgia Department of Natural Resources’ Wildlife Resources Division. Releases can be found online at https://georgiawildlife.com/recent-press-release-wrd.



Also follow Wildlife Resources Division through:

• Facebook (www.facebook.com/WildlifeResourcesDivisionGADNR )
• Twitter (www.twitter.com/GeorgiaWild )
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• Blog (https://georgiawildlife.blog/)
• YouTube (www.youtube.com/GeorgiaWildlife )
• Georgia Wild, a free e-newsletter (www.georgiawildlife.com/archive)



For more information, contact:

Melissa Cummings, Communications/Outreach Specialist: 706.557.3326; melissa.cummings@dnr.ga.gov



FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE



CHRONIC WASTING DISEASE DETECTED IN ALABAMA DEER; HELP PREVENT SPREAD TO GEORGIA



SOCIAL CIRCLE, Ga. (January 7, 2022) – The Alabama Department of Conservation and Wildlife Resources announced Friday that Chronic Wasting Disease has been detected in a sample collected from a harvested deer in Alabama, a first for that state. CWD has not been detected in the state of Georgia, according to the Georgia Department of Natural Resources’ Wildlife Resources Division (WRD).



Chronic Wasting Disease is a fatal neurological disease of deer, elk, and moose caused by infectious proteins called prions. Currently, there are no treatments, and the disease always results in the death of the infected animal. There are no preventative vaccines to protect animals that have not been infected.



How You Can Help Prevent Spread



Hunters are advised that live importation of all deer species from other states is prohibited and has been since 2005.



Georgia hunters that hunt in CWD positive states may only bring home boned out meat, hides, cleaned skull plate with antlers attached, elk ivories, and finished taxidermy mounts. All other carcass parts must be left behind.



CWD positive states and locations are Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming as well as Canadian provinces Alberta, Quebec, and Saskatchewan.



For more information, visit the WRD website at https://georgiawildlife.com/cwd.
 

Milkman

Deer Farmer Moderator
Staff member
Thanks Charlie!!
Do you know what area of Alabama this deer came from?
 

JB0704

The Original JB
What generally happens after this relevant to game management and impact on local herds?
 

Dustin Pate

Administrator
Staff member
That throws a major wrench into a lot of folks hunting just over the line. For example, take the West Point Lake COE land. Someone may put in at a Georgia boat ramp and ease a very short distance and be on the Alabama portion. You would have to completely clean that deer before returning to the ramp.
 

C.Killmaster

Georgia Deer Biologist
That throws a major wrench into a lot of folks hunting just over the line. For example, take the West Point Lake COE land. Someone may put in at a Georgia boat ramp and ease a very short distance and be on the Alabama portion. You would have to completely clean that deer before returning to the ramp.

That's an unfortunate artifact of using political boundaries for wildlife and disease management.
 

C.Killmaster

Georgia Deer Biologist
What generally happens after this relevant to game management and impact on local herds?

I can't speak for Alabama, but in Georgia our plan is to substantially increase sampling and establish a disease management zone. Ideally hunters and landowners in the affected area would be permitted to shoot most of those deer for that sampling. The management zone would have restrictions on leaving the zone with whole carcasses, likely a feeding ban, and have multiple drop off sites for testing. The longer term management of the disease is highly targeted culling by removing only the deer that likely overlapped home ranges with any positive deer.

The scorched earth policies that other agencies tried 20 years ago to shoot out the deer population of the whole disease management zone failed to control the disease and drove a wedge between hunters and the wildlife agency. We learned from that and opted for the surgical approach that has been working well in other states at keeping disease prevalence down.
 

gma1320

I like a Useles Billy Thread
That throws a major wrench into a lot of folks hunting just over the line. For example, take the West Point Lake COE land. Someone may put in at a Georgia boat ramp and ease a very short distance and be on the Alabama portion. You would have to completely clean that deer before returning to the ramp.
That's an unfortunate artifact of using political boundaries for wildlife and disease management.
Think about how that will effect someone who puts in a Dewberry to hunt in Georgia and kills a deer here and has to get it home
 
I can't speak for Alabama, but in Georgia our plan is to substantially increase sampling and establish a disease management zone. Ideally hunters and landowners in the affected area would be permitted to shoot most of those deer for that sampling. The management zone would have restrictions on leaving the zone with whole carcasses, likely a feeding ban, and have multiple drop off sites for testing. The longer term management of the disease is highly targeted culling by removing only the deer that likely overlapped home ranges with any positive deer.

The scorched earth policies that other agencies tried 20 years ago to shoot out the deer population of the whole disease management zone failed to control the disease and drove a wedge between hunters and the wildlife agency. We learned from that and opted for the surgical approach that has been working well in other states at keeping disease prevalence down.

It appears Alabama is taking that approach as well according to what they just released.
Lauderdale has been divided into two zones affected and buffer and the daily/seasonal bag limits either sex have been lifted for the remainder of the season which runs to Feb 10. All deer to be submitted for testing in affected with the buffer being urged to do so as well. This applies to both public and private with all other hunting on public prohibited. Nothing moving out of either area unless fully boned out and processed.

If it's brown it's down is now state mandated and they want to look at it to boot.

I hope the folks back home step up and make it happen. Even if scorched earth isn't an option long term the biologists need data asap.
 

Spotlite

Resident Homesteader
That throws a major wrench into a lot of folks hunting just over the line. For example, take the West Point Lake COE land. Someone may put in at a Georgia boat ramp and ease a very short distance and be on the Alabama portion. You would have to completely clean that deer before returning to the ramp.

Seems to be a fine line between hunting a CWD state and killing deer that just crossed the line from a CWD state.

The Water Works portion of West Point has a good bit of deer bouncing back and forth between GA and AL without any water boundaries.

Of course we’ve seen them swim from AL into GA and vice versa.

Hope the hunter would take the same precautions as he would if he killed it in a CWD state.
 
Seems to be a fine line between hunting a CWD state and killing deer that just crossed the line from a CWD state.

The Water Works portion of West Point has a good bit of deer bouncing back and forth between GA and AL without any water boundaries.

Of course we’ve seen them swim from AL into GA and vice versa.

Hope the hunter would take the same precautions as he would if he killed it in a CWD state.

Sounds like good advice to me. Act as if and step up our game to try to prevent.
 

AliBubba

Senior Member
I think we are doing the right thing by taking corrective actions and preventative actions (CAPA)...
 

buckpasser

Senior Member
I’m really glad Charlie is a member here. We are privileged to get info straight “from the horses mouth”. That said, I doubt I’ll get to be an old man without reading from him, on here, that it’s in GA. I also don’t think there’s any sense in really doing anything too drastic once it’s here. I just appreciate the ongoing testing and will also appreciate the monitoring once it’s here as I’m not planning to eat venison from a CWD area if I can help it. Thanks GADNR and @C.Killmaster! I’m glad you’re on this!
 

buckpasser

Senior Member
Some states have but their urine gets shipped around.

Ban the deer urine sales and no financial incentive to have a deer farm?

I’m for banning all cervid enclosures, period. They benefit a few and have/will harm many. It’s a no brainer. We don’t need them for meat. We don’t need them to facilitate fake hunters. We don’t need them for a darn thing.
 
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