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Oklahoma to combat CWD by releasing Captive deer

Fascinating concept. But the length of research and understanding of what is occurring is rudimentary at best, and possibly highly flawed. EXTREMELY dangerous - to the point of absolute scientific malpractice - to release those deer into the wild.

My guess, the legislator is being bamboozled by deer breeders trying desperately to save their industry.

Nature will get around to finding deer genetically resistant to CWD. Get out of her way and let her work.
 
Deer breeders ain't spreading CWD. That was done in the back of hunter's trucks if it wasn't an already naturally occurring thing.

And heck, at least someone is being proactive. May not be the best idea but it beats telling hunters to kill every deer they see. You know, because that has worked everywhere it's been tried.
 
CWD when it's endemic in the herd is worse than almost anything. Selective breeding is how scrapie was eliminated from the sheep industry. I agree there are some risks to the wild population but compared to CWD they seem minimal.

Sure I think deer will eventually overcome the disease on their own in a few hundred years. But, that's too long! Millions of deer will die maybe unnecessarily and the deer hunting tradition will die.

I say do it! CWD is just too terrible!
 
With so little data and time to observe negative effects, releasing genetically modified deer into the wild is the kind of scientific hubris and arrogance that brought is Covid 19.
 
fairchaser said:
CWD when it's endemic in the herd is worse than almost anything. Selective breeding is how scrapie was eliminated from the sheep industry. I agree there are some risks to the wild population but compared to CWD they seem minimal.

Sure I think deer will eventually overcome the disease on their own in a few hundred years. But, that's too long! Millions of deer will die maybe unnecessarily and the deer hunting tradition will die.

I say do it! CWD is just too terrible!
Click to expand...

I would imagine that it took a considerable amount of time to breed resistant sheep too. Realistically they had to eliminate (kill) all sheep that were susceptible and replace them with sheep that weren't- no small feat behind a fence, and probably impossible outside of one. All a sheep needs to do is resist the disease until it reaches slaughter age- typically a year or less. CWD immune deer need to last a lot longer.

What else gets bred out with that gene as well? There's always other consequences, kinda like fast food tomatoes. They're terrible because they're bred to not get crushed in a huge box in transport. No room for flavor and disease resistance from what I've been told.
 
I think its just a way for the deer farms to save face as well as continue to make money. Some of the guys on the facebook groups are arguing the deer farms had nothing to do with CWD or its spread.

But if data shows it would work I wouldn't be against it. And as bad as Ames is, could it make things worse?
 
MickThompson said:
I would imagine that it took a considerable amount of time to breed resistant sheep too. Realistically they had to eliminate (kill) all sheep that were susceptible and replace them with sheep that weren't- no small feat behind a fence, and probably impossible outside of one. All a sheep needs to do is resist the disease until it reaches slaughter age- typically a year or less. CWD immune deer need to last a lot longer.

What else gets bred out with that gene as well? There's always other consequences, kinda like fast food tomatoes. They're terrible because they're bred to not get crushed in a huge box in transport. No room for flavor and disease resistance from what I've been told.
Click to expand...
In 50 years there's been no answer for a way to fight back against this disease other than to try and kill everything. From what I've heard, scrapie was eliminated completely by breeding out certain susceptible genetics and breeding in resistant genetics. Nature will do this eventually but at what cost? You say we might get something worse than CWD in the heard. What can be worse than death?
 
BigAl said:
I think its just a way for the deer farms to save face as well as continue to make money. Some of the guys on the facebook groups are arguing the deer farms had nothing to do with CWD or its spread.

But if data shows it would work I wouldn't be against it. And as bad as Ames is, could it make things worse?
Click to expand...
Deer farming had everything to do with the spread of CWD (although not it's creation). And often through illegal means (selling breeder bucks to people they knew were releasing these deer into the wild).

What data? two to three years of data from one facility? No long-term studies on potential side effects and genetic anomalies? And once any potential problems are out in the wild, there's no turning back. Absolute scientific malpractice.

Altering viruses to make them super-contagious in humans isn't a problem. It's such important research. We can control it. How did that work out?
 
fairchaser said:
CWD when it's endemic in the herd is worse than almost anything. Selective breeding is how scrapie was eliminated from the sheep industry. I agree there are some risks to the wild population but compared to CWD they seem minimal.

Sure I think deer will eventually overcome the disease on their own in a few hundred years. But, that's too long! Millions of deer will die maybe unnecessarily and the deer hunting tradition will die.

I say do it! CWD is just too terrible!
Click to expand...
So terrible that 60 years later there are still huntable populations where it first begin🙄 mankind will make this a thousand times worse by interfering rather than letting nature handle it!
 
AlabamaSwamper said:
Deer breeders ain't spreading CWD. That was done in the back of hunter's trucks if it wasn't an already naturally occurring thing.

And heck, at least someone is being proactive. May not be the best idea but it beats telling hunters to kill every deer they see. You know, because that has worked everywhere it's been tried.
Click to expand...
It was definitely in breeding herds than shipped all over the damn country, get your head out of the sand, the breeders have caused more harm to hunting than the tv hunters or antis every thought of, and all for a dollar!!
 
fairchaser said:
In 50 years there's been no answer for a way to fight back against this disease other than to try and kill everything. From what I've heard, scrapie was eliminated completely by breeding out certain susceptible genetics and breeding in resistant genetics. Nature will do this eventually but at what cost? You say we might get something worse than CWD in the heard. What can be worse than death?
Click to expand...
Pen raised quail come to mind. The act of farming and domesticating them renders them unable to sustain in the wild with just a few generations.

I guess I'm saying that sometimes there are no easy answers except to not screw it up in the first place but that's not really in human nature though.
 
Read the article...

According to it, the first case of CWD was detected just last year after over a decade of sampling...

So OK wants to release captive deer into wild herds that do not even have CWD??? That makes zero sense.
 
knightrider said:
It was definitely in breeding herds than shipped all over the damn country, get your head out of the sand, the breeders have caused more harm to hunting than the tv hunters or antis every thought of, and all for a dollar!!
Click to expand...
Of course it was and still is

But deer riding in the back of trucks from Midwest states contributed to the spread in most areas.

Captive deer started it but hunters spread it way more than deer breeders.
 
knightrider said:
It was definitely in breeding herds than shipped all over the damn country, get your head out of the sand, the breeders have caused more harm to hunting than the tv hunters or antis every thought of, and all for a dollar!!
Click to expand...
Of course it was and still is

But deer riding in the back of trucks from Midwest states contributed to the spread in most areas.

Captive deer started it but hunters spread it way more than deer breeders.
BSK said:
Deer farming had everything to do with the spread of CWD (although not it's creation). And often through illegal means (selling breeder bucks to people they knew were releasing these deer into the wild).
Click to expand...
Any chance this happened in West Tennessee?
 
megalomaniac said:
Read the article...

According to it, the first case of CWD was detected just last year after over a decade of sampling...

So OK wants to release captive deer into wild herds that do not even have CWD??? That makes zero sense.
Click to expand...
I bet without much digging you would find the bill sponsor(s) are friends with deer breeders
 

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