The comment about plants being infected via water sure gave be pause...not to mention the potential to disrupt agriculture. Can this really be happening?
The down side is pretty gnarly. So let's hope it doesn't spread to people easily if at all and we are good to go!
And when the S hits the markets, expect a new world order in Agricultural. This will be unlike anying seen before.
No country is going to accept imports of crops that test positive for CWD. The word Embargo will be trending.
Speculators and International trade negotiators are holding this card close, ready to use when desired.
And then there is the implications to wildlife that carry and spread the prions. A Scorched Earth policy will be implemented....
Some Game Farmers have expressed joy with the possibilities. No wild populations, a fully captive market....
The possibilities that are so close to being a reality are truly Epoch.
So far it hasn't been able to infect humans, cattle, sheep, goats, birds, fish, etc.
Mad cow couldn’t affect humans, but then it did and killed a lot of people
The article talks about how it could make a leap to effecting people. We may not be susceptible to it from eating meat, but maybe we are susceptible to it through eating plants.
In all seriousness CWD is something I used to laugh off. Not anymore. My wife is a PhD biochemist and this stuff is for real.
Jaquomo's Link
What is truly scary is the the prions have been shown to be able to mutate to survive in a new host environment. This plus the extreme difficulty of destroying the prions could theoretically be ripe for "a hostile take over"....not trying to hype up fear, but it doesn't take much imagination to at least consider this could be the perfect "disease" in the making (theoretically!). Or maybe it's been around for centuries...?
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/12/101217083232.htm
Hank Williams said it best, " You'll never get out of this world alive "
elkstabber's Link
Here is what a deer farmer in TX is saying. Obviously he is motivated to downplay the significance of CWD because his livelihood depends on it. I'm simply posting it as relevant information. I'm not saying that he's right.
Old school..you want wild game meat..You hunt ........When the first case of this was found in farm raised wild animals , every one of these "Unnatural" wild game farms should have been shut down ...
Just like mining on the edge of protected wilderness , and a eventual (Irreversible) spill/contamination ........Its not if....its WHEN !
Read Wyoming regs related to CWD. Very confusing and a logistical nightmare to get something tested especially for non-res hunters who may have many miles ahead on the road. We've been stopped at a mandatory check station in known CWD area and G&F never mentioned anything about CWD or testing.
Sorry, but you are not correct. There are many theories, but the most credible about where CWD originated in NORTH AMERICA was that it was created in the lab at Colorado State University back in the 50/60s. You can follow its spread out through the years from there. Really makes me wonder who is paying your Bowriter, because that is not an informed statement. I know all your anecdotal evidence from old time ranchers, but that just doesn't hold water. And Texas has one of the most population dense whitetail herds anywhere, and there have been ZERO cases in Texas that can't be traced back to deer bringing it in from New Mexico or in a trailer to deer farms.
But what do I know, I am just a veterinarian who lives close to the first case in South Texas and have deer farm clients and has probably sent in over 1000 samples from farm and native deer.
Norway cases?? Well if it mutated in Colorado, it certainly mutate elsewhere in the world under the right conditions.
Yes, it can and does stay in the soil or on plants for years. Digging up the dirt from one of the pens and burning it, did no good. Without a doubt, the two biggest factors in the spread of CWD are cervid farming and concentrated baiting and feeding. But to think just because it hasn't been found in your state, it does not exist is foolish. If you don't want to find, don't test for it. But, be assured it is and has been everywhere there are cervids. My state, TN currently brags we do not have it. That is pure BS. Of course we have it, have had for many years. We just have not tested enough to find it and probably won't. So, let us all now panic.
Our neighbours to the west in Saskatchewan tested roughly 11% positive deer in both 2015 and 2016. Manitoba has tested 0%. If it "was and has always been" then we should test roughly the same amount positive as them. Yet we don't. Some part of this argument doesn't make sense to me.
It is true, all of the answers are not known and may never be. At this point the past "pretesting era" is largely irrelevant, what we learn the next ten years will be. I agree, we need more widespread testing. In the meantime, my family will eat other meat protein and venison which has been tested.
Just a safe calming claim to make with seemingly no logic and science behind it...
The Kid's Link
APauls, was the 11% figure on Sask. deer from harvested deer, or all deer in a survey?
IMO, deer scents should be tested, has this been done? If not, jeeze whiz that is pathetic research progress on something of huge economic and health importance. We need many more facts on CWD. The history of it is important, IMO. There would hardly been any facts about CWD that wouldn't be important. This thing needs to be understood.
I also wonder whether immunization would even be possible against these prions. If they often spontaneously mutate, you have the markings of a perfect disease esp. given the difficulty of eradication.
Lou, how concerned are you eating CO. venison and what is your opinon of the situation in Eastern CO.?
Anything that brings deer in close contact with other deer or where they have been, is harmful, potentially a vector. Therefore, stop a minute and consider what does that and what are the major factors. See, just common sense. Do just a little research on prion borne diseases. How many of them occurred, naturally? I can't think right off hand of any. But I am sure there is data to prove otherwise. If it occurs naturally, only one way to stamp it out.
Now, think of all the new diseases that have been discovered in man. Why or how were they discovered? Simply because we developed new testing methods. Could that not also be true of CWD? What other diseases might cervidae have? We won't know until we test for them, will we?
Years ago, deer were fawned, they lived, some died of natural causes and their bodies were quickly consumed. Life was good, no worries. EHD and other diseases were a way of life. Then, along came CWD and mass hysteria and panic set in.
If the deer is healthy, I eat it. If it isn't, I kill it, tag it, call the biologist. He has a PhD in this crap and has said for a long time, "CWD has been here a lot longer than you, Sloan and you are old as dirt."
But right now, I have a problem in my yard. Sumbuck wants my mater plants. Hope he doesn't have TKD.
CWD started at Colorados Foothills Wildlife Research Station, in a pen that had held scrappie infected sheep and that healthy mule deer does were placed. PERIOD. Anyone who says different is not educated on CWDs history, repeating stuff without any knowledge, or (fill in thee blank).
Wild deer exhibiting CWD symptoms had been observed in the adjoining foothills by ranchers and hunters for generations, long before the deer pen research started. Some of those deer would regularly come down to the pens and nuzzle the penned deer through the fence, especially during the rut. So nobody knows for certain if the prion folding occurred outside the pens and was transmitted to the concentrated population inside, or vice versa.
It hasn't been found in Yukon moose...yet.... The tested sample size is very small. It hadn't been found in our CO Shiras moose until it was. It wasn't found in the Norway reindeer until it was. Same with the South Korean deer.
David, nobody in our area that I know of even bothers with testing unless it's mandatory (for moose, for example). The panic happened here, they slaughtered a lot of wild deer, nothing changed, life went on, and the incidence of CJD-V among humans in our county is lower than the national average. Tens of thousands of people have eaten infected deer for many decades. Roughly 15% of the mature bucks have it and we all know that, and people eat them anyway with no ill effects. What "might" happen, might happen, just as someone "might" get hit by a texting teenager and killed on the way to go hunting.
Some of those does, and later deer in the pens were shipped to a Wo research station, while others went to two zoos, and several private properties.
CWD was identified by then Doctor Beth Williams much later in 1978 as a TSE disease, exactly like scrappie. In her papers Beth Williams said she feared that they(the researchers) had set the stage for a new disease in deer. Pretty sure she would know much more than anyone else what happened. It came from close contact with infected soil in those research pens at Ft Collins...too many deer on saturated infected soil is what made the transmission to deer possible.
We will never know where originated. What we do know is that is is starting to appear in places where there is no link to the "hot zone", it only affects a small percentage of the population exposed to it in wild conditions, and the more testing done on large sample sizes, the more prevalent it appears to be.
"It is out there everywhere, we just aren't testing for it" doesn't hold much water in Texas...........................
It is spreading naturally from the initial areas where it formed and all other areas can 98% be traced to a trailer hauling infected animals to new areas.
People are saying that it is everywhere and so we should have free access to haul deer anywhere we want. My main point is THAT IS NOT TRUE. Hauling infected deer by a trailer is how CWD is leapfrogging from area to area in the US. And I don't want it in my area any faster than it gets there by natural movment
btw, I was at CSU last year, is this the area a hundred or so yds. below where the bison are on the hill overlooking CSU?
And yes, Bowriter it is hard to prove a negative. We could have a million negatives and you could still say, "you are just not testing the infected animals". But 74, 000+ negatives are a pretty good indication that it is not widespread. Look at places in the Midwest where it has spread too. There are places with a HIGH percentage of the population infected (40+, in some places). And with Texas's high deer densities, if it were here naturally, just like up there, we would have gotten some positives with that many tests.
I am convinced it is not on my ranch yet, and I do not want someone hauling it to the area in a trailer!
I never really gave it much thought, been around CWD since I was a kid and never ate sickly critters (that I know of). How all these opinions are floating around, it's like making a decision with darts, a spinning wheel and a bottle of Jack.
But can prions really mutate...they have no DNA. They can change, but is the changed permanent, does it even follow any Mendelian principles?
"Saskatchewan sent a shipment of Elk to Korea to promote game farming there and the production of antler velvet for market. Those initial animals were infected with CWD"
http://cwd-info.org/announcement/first-case-in-south-korea/
Hmmm. Looks like there was some trailers involved in hauling infected animals to Korea....
ryanrc's Link
Among the measures that state wildlife managers favor:
• Increasing hunting of CWD-infected bucks and bull elk to reduce the prevalence in “hot-spot” herds.
• Monitoring the spread of CWD through mandatory testing, at least every three years, of carcasses.
• Launching an early-detection system based on collecting animals killed along highways, then testing tissues for CWD. Studies have shown roadkill deer are 2.5 times more likely to carry CWD, which apparently renders animals more vulnerable to being hit by cars.
• Discouraging large gatherings of deer, elk and moose to slow the spread of CWD via exchanges of animal body fluids. Tactics include removing of salt licks for cows and enforcement of rules prohibiting baiting of big game.
• Slowing the spread of CWD by requiring safe disposal of carcasses at landfills.
• Enlisting cities and towns to help fight the disease.
• Stopping the transport of deer and elk carcasses between states.
“We’re at a very critical point. We need to do something. This is not only in Colorado. It is nationwide. And there are other states that have a higher prevalence,” Colorado Wildlife Commissioner Marie Haskett said, referring to Wyoming.
Haskett also urged better communication because, she said, some hunters wrongly believe that CWD remains only in the brains of infected animals. Testing has shown CWD eventually spreads into bones and muscles.
“We’re going to be proactive taking steps,” she said, “to prevent it from growing,”
Federal agencies apparently aren’t involved.
A decade ago, Colorado wildlife managers tested thousands of deer and elk each year to track the spread of the disease, records show. But that level of monitoring ceased. But then mandatory testing by hunters between 2015 and 2017 revealed CWD spikes in some parts of the state. Hardest-hit herds include those along the Front Range west of Colorado Springs, metro Denver and Fort Collins, and near Craig, in northwestern Colorado.
CPW officials said they’re aiming tentatively for a 10 percent infection threshold as a trigger for mandatory testing and increased hunting.
Coloradans for Responsible Wildlife Management, a 1,300-member group based in Cañon City, has encouraged an open public process before CPW settles on a strategy for fighting the disease, director Dan Gates said.
“Wildlife is a resource. Nobody wants to see it go away,” he said. “We’re trying to do what is best for wildlife for multiple generations.”.
Nationally, a Chronic Wasting Disease Alliance has formed to help coordinate state responses.
For hunters, the best approach is caution, alliance director Matt Dunfee said.
“Get it tested. If it is positive, do not eat it,” he said. “There’s been no successful management technique to eliminate this disease or halt its progress long-term. It spreads geographically and it increases in prevalence. What we do know is that, with mule deer and white-tailed deer, we get significant herd impacts when CWD hits the 20 percent threshold.
“If you are a hunter, we will need you to hunt because we need the samples you can provide. If you are a wildlife enthusiast and want to see healthy deer and elk, you’ll need to push for funding for studies and for implementing all the recommendations in this plan for scientific management of CWD. The challenge for the public will be allowing these animals to be harvested. This disease does not go away. There is no vaccine. It is always fatal. And the only hope we have to manage it is to try to keep the prevalence low.”
DTala is right but there is more to it. It only takes one infected animal to have been in the pen. The soil retains the agent for...nobody knows how long. One animal, in transit can spread it tremendously. Now, that is regarding penned and farmed animals. In the wild-and for sure it occurs in the wild-it is spread most actively through concentration of animals. That is why, this, "• Discouraging large gatherings of deer, elk and moose to slow the spread of CWD via exchanges of animal body fluids. Tactics include removing of salt licks for cows and enforcement of rules prohibiting baiting of big game." was listed above. It is simple common sense, no different from an infectious disease in humans.
