Allen Waters
Senior Member
December 30,2011
The Missouri Department of Agriculture is finalizing a depopulation and management plan for an approximately 3,000 acre captive wildlife hunting facility in northern Missouri following two positive tests for Chronic Wasting Disease. The facility, operated by Heartland Wildlife Ranches, LLC, is home to white-tail deer, elk and red deer.
The plan includes a requirement to depopulate and test all remaining animals for CWD, as well as restrictions on the future movement of animals into the facility. The plan follows multiple positive CWD tests indentified through random surveillance and extends the facility's current quarantine until all animals have been depopulated and tested for the disease.
In October, MDA received results from the USDA National Veterinary Services Laboratory in Ames, Iowa indicating that a captive white-tail deer harvested in the Macon County facility tested positive for CWD. The animal that tested positive was inspected as part of the State's CWD surveillance and testing program. A second positive test result on a captive white-tail deer within the same facility was verified late this week.
Date: January 24, 2012
Source: Missouri Department of Conservation
Contacts:
Missouri Department of Conservation
Two positive results for Chronic Wasting Disease are first for free-ranging deer in Missouri.
JEFFERSON CITY Mo – The Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) received two positive test results for Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) from 1,077 tissue samples taken from free-ranging deer harvested by hunters in north-central Missouri during the 2011 fall firearms deer season. Both positive test results were from adult bucks harvested by Missouri hunters in Macon County, and are the first CWD-positive results for free-ranging deer in Missouri.
MDC plans to obtain more tissue samples for CWD testing by harvesting additional deer in the immediate area where the two infected deer were harvested.
“Teamwork among landowners, hunters and MDC staff allowed us to detect this infection early,” said MDC Deer Biologist Jason Sumners. “We will be working with local landowners to harvest additional deer for tissue sampling. This is a first step and one of our best hopes for containing, and perhaps even eliminating, what we believe to be a recent localized event.”
MDC staff have contacted the two Missouri hunters who harvested the CWD-positive bucks to inform them of the situation and answer questions.
The State's CWD Contingency Plan was developed in 2002 and revised in 2003 by the Cervid Health Committee, a task force comprised of industry representatives, veterinarians and staff from the departments of Agriculture, Conservation and Health and Senior Services and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
In February 2010 a case of CWD was confirmed in Linn County on a captive hunting preserve operated by the same entity, Heartland Wildlife Ranches, LLC. The Linn County facility was depopulated and no further infection was identified at that facility.
CWD is transmitted by live animal to animal contact or soil to animal contact. The disease was first recognized in 1967 in captive mule deer in the Colorado Division of Wildlife captive wildlife research facility in Fort Collins, Colorado. CWD has been documented in deer and/or elk in Colorado, Illinois, Kansas, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and the Canadian Provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan.
The Missouri Department of Agriculture is finalizing a depopulation and management plan for an approximately 3,000 acre captive wildlife hunting facility in northern Missouri following two positive tests for Chronic Wasting Disease. The facility, operated by Heartland Wildlife Ranches, LLC, is home to white-tail deer, elk and red deer.
The plan includes a requirement to depopulate and test all remaining animals for CWD, as well as restrictions on the future movement of animals into the facility. The plan follows multiple positive CWD tests indentified through random surveillance and extends the facility's current quarantine until all animals have been depopulated and tested for the disease.
In October, MDA received results from the USDA National Veterinary Services Laboratory in Ames, Iowa indicating that a captive white-tail deer harvested in the Macon County facility tested positive for CWD. The animal that tested positive was inspected as part of the State's CWD surveillance and testing program. A second positive test result on a captive white-tail deer within the same facility was verified late this week.
Date: January 24, 2012
Source: Missouri Department of Conservation
Contacts:
Missouri Department of Conservation
Two positive results for Chronic Wasting Disease are first for free-ranging deer in Missouri.
JEFFERSON CITY Mo – The Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) received two positive test results for Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) from 1,077 tissue samples taken from free-ranging deer harvested by hunters in north-central Missouri during the 2011 fall firearms deer season. Both positive test results were from adult bucks harvested by Missouri hunters in Macon County, and are the first CWD-positive results for free-ranging deer in Missouri.
MDC plans to obtain more tissue samples for CWD testing by harvesting additional deer in the immediate area where the two infected deer were harvested.
“Teamwork among landowners, hunters and MDC staff allowed us to detect this infection early,” said MDC Deer Biologist Jason Sumners. “We will be working with local landowners to harvest additional deer for tissue sampling. This is a first step and one of our best hopes for containing, and perhaps even eliminating, what we believe to be a recent localized event.”
MDC staff have contacted the two Missouri hunters who harvested the CWD-positive bucks to inform them of the situation and answer questions.
The State's CWD Contingency Plan was developed in 2002 and revised in 2003 by the Cervid Health Committee, a task force comprised of industry representatives, veterinarians and staff from the departments of Agriculture, Conservation and Health and Senior Services and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
In February 2010 a case of CWD was confirmed in Linn County on a captive hunting preserve operated by the same entity, Heartland Wildlife Ranches, LLC. The Linn County facility was depopulated and no further infection was identified at that facility.
CWD is transmitted by live animal to animal contact or soil to animal contact. The disease was first recognized in 1967 in captive mule deer in the Colorado Division of Wildlife captive wildlife research facility in Fort Collins, Colorado. CWD has been documented in deer and/or elk in Colorado, Illinois, Kansas, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and the Canadian Provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan.
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One at a time... I'll take them one at a time. Thank you sir!!
