FR News is a new effort on my part to share news pertaining to the world of fishing, hunting and the outdoors in general. If you see an important news item feel free to contact me with a link at fontinalisrising@gmail.com

A 2.5 year old buck in Lanier County, Georgia, has tested positive for Chronic Wasting Disease. The sample tested positive during routine surveillance testing done by the state. Lanier County is in the southern part of the state near Florida and just east of I-75.

Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) is a prion disease like Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (sometimes called Mad Cow disease) and the human equivalent is called Creutzfeld-Jakob disease. All are 100% fatal. Symptoms in deer include lethargy, tameness, drooling, unsteady gait and emaciation. It is difficult to detect before the onset of symptoms and can take 1-2 years for symptoms to manifest after infection. The prions, misshapen proteins that replicate themselves in the body of the host, can persist for years in soil and on surfaces, are not destroyed by cooking, and require temperatures in excess of 1800 degrees Fahrenheit to destroy.

At present there are no known cases where CWD has crossed over and infected humans. So far it only appears to infect members of the deer family including elk and moose, but white-tailed deer are the main carriers of the disease. There have been a couple clusters of Creutzfeld-Jakob disease among hunters who consumed infected venison, but at present a direct connection has not been established, and other factors may have been responsible for those infections.

These are the basics of the disease, and the limits of my technical knowledge gleaned from years of reading about it. It has been disheartening watching the slow spread of CWD across the country over the last three decades (since I became aware of it), accompanied by a considerable amount of political bickering. My take is we don’t want any such disease impacting the animals we love. It is a slow, cruel death. Unfortunately it doesn’t appear much can be done to stop it. Hunters have been encouraged not to transport the main vectors of the disease- bones, spinal columns, lymph nodes, brain matter and spinal fluid- from CWD positive states, but they are still allowed to transport meat and antlers still attached to cleaned skull plates, so you have to question how serious any of the states have been about preventing the spread of such an insidious disease. Captive deer farming operations have been a primary vector of the disease by shipping infected deer across state lines. Many states have taken a hard line against shipping of deer, but not enough.

What can we do? If you see deer behaving unusually and otherwise displaying symptoms of CWD, report them to your state game agency immediately. Hunters can submit samples to their state game agency for testing (look for that to ramp up in Georgia this year). We can educate ourselves and follow the guidance and regulations put out by the Georgia Wildlife Resources Division. CWD has not crossed the species barrier- yet. CWD was first identified in Colorado in 1967 and has yet to infect humans, but it doesn’t mean it’s impossible. If and when it does you will see massive negative impacts to deer and deer hunting. Hopefully we can slow or contain the spread, but the fact that it has spread over the decades to 36 states and 3 Canadian provinces and now Georgia is not a hopeful sign.

I’ll leave you with some links to information on CWD in Georgia as well as general information.

Georgia DNR press release

Georgia DNR response plan

And a helpful fact sheet from Cornell University

My point of sharing all this is to spread knowledge and awareness, not fear. It allows us as hunters to make informed decisions as to how and where we hunt, how we handle carcasses and meat, and steps we can take to help slow the spread. Even though CWD has yet to infect humans, I’m sure none of us want to see deer suffering from such a terrible disease, nor do we want to reach a day where it does infect humans. Stay informed, comply with the state response plan and hopefully the impacts can be minimized.