TWRA Letter to Land Owners

What do they mean with the words "targeted removal program". Does targeted mean deer that are of certain age? sex? look/act a certain way? or any deer that is alive? or all deer in the area? I'm curious as to which deer are targeted which ones are not.

I can't help but think that some deer are going to be naturally immune to CWD, I may wrong. But indiscriminately wiping them out how would we ever know?

But on the other side of the argument, if it is evidently going to spread are we not just delaying what is going to happen anyway. I'm not saying not to try, but what other methods are being tried?
 
Targeted as I interpret is geographically…the very next sentence states "periphery of the disease range." That combined with the fact one cannot discern an infected deer by simply looking at it + the last sentence in the 3rd paragraph.

They know full-well there will be deer killed that test negative.
 
It's interesting to me that so little confidence in the agency to do the right thing regarding CWD. These are trained and educated researchers with PhD educations and decades of wildlife management under their belt. They also have collaborated with other agencies to determine the best path in slowing the spread of this deadly disease.

This is a complex disease that spreads by deer proximity and deer density. Once it takes hold, it is very difficult or impossible to reverse.

I'm not suggesting that we blindly follow the powers that be but we should do our own research before making off the cuff decisions. The ultimate goal should be to keep the infection rate as low as possible for as long as possible.

Most can't understand why we would kill deer to keep deer from dying but nobody would hesitate to kill a cow with a contagious disease before it infected their entire herd.
 
fairchaser said:
It's interesting to me that so little confidence in the agency to do the right thing regarding CWD. These are trained and educated researchers with PhD educations and decades of wildlife management under their belt. They also have collaborated with other agencies to determine the best path in slowing the spread of this deadly disease.

This is a complex disease that spreads by deer proximity and deer density. Once it takes hold, it is very difficult or impossible to reverse.

I'm not suggesting that we blindly follow the powers that be but we should do our own research before making off the cuff decisions. The ultimate goal should be to keep the infection rate as low as possible for as long as possible.

Most can't understand why we would kill deer to keep deer from dying but nobody would hesitate to kill a cow with a contagious disease before it infected their entire herd.
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Has this approach worked in other States? I'm curious.
 
Lost Lake said:
Has this approach worked in other States? I'm curious.
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It was tried in Wisconsin but without much cooperation from landowners. Deer just ran from one small property to another. Also, it's very difficult to measure success on a chronic disease that takes years to show up.

I'm not saying it would work for the same reasons. The cooperation wouldn't be consistent enough to have any meaningful impact. I would say it didn't work but I guess they need to try!

Btw, they asked Ames the same thing and they were turned down. I think the medicine while it might be the right one is too hard to swallow.
 
fairchaser said:
It was tried in Wisconsin but without much cooperation from landowners. Deer just ran from one small property to another. Also, it's very difficult to measure success on a chronic disease that takes years to show up.

I'm not saying it would work for the same reasons. The cooperation wouldn't be consistent enough to have any meaningful impact. I would say it didn't work but I guess they need to try!

Btw, they asked Ames the same thing and they were turned down. I think the medicine while it might be the right one is too hard to swallow.
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Thank you for your response.

I'm certainly not a biologist, but it just doesn't make any sense to me. It's inevitable that it's coming, (big thanks to deer enclosures IMO), so my way of thinking is that you can at least see quite a few deer while hunting, or virtually zero deer while hunting after they hammer them down to next to nil.

I'd rather let nature sort it out, and if there is the possibility that some are immune they might get to pass that on if they aren't slaughtered wholesale. Man brought this problem to deer, and I have my doubts as to whether he can fix it.

Our farm is in Henry, and I'll eventually be getting one of these letters I'd bet.

My interest would lie more with letting us know what they plan on doing about private deer enclosures, as my bet is that that's where this whole jacked up mess started near Ames. And, I'll bet they know who it was. Tennessee hunters who own the resource have a right to know. I'd like to see them work as aggressively on that as they are taking out healthy deer.

Depredation permits are already issued for a lot of row crop farmers in West Tennessee. We have enough needless slaughter and extreme wanton waste there, and that's removing deer already near hot zones. If it's carcasses they want for testing, it shouldn't be any problem to gather them where they are rotting in fields, most likely gut shot by a farmer who'll probably be receiving an insurance claim anyway.

I see no need to jack up anything worse than already has been. That's not aimed at you Fairchaser. I respect you greatly.
 
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Lost Lake said:
Thank you for your response.

I'm certainly not a biologist, but it just doesn't make any sense to me. It's inevitable that it's coming, (big thanks to deer enclosures IMO), so my way of thinking is that you can at least see quite a few deer while hunting, or virtually zero deer while hunting after they hammer them down to next to nil.

I'd rather let nature sort it out, and if there is the possibility that some are immune they might get to pass that on if they aren't slaughtered wholesale. Man brought this problem to deer, and I have my doubts as to whether he can fix it.

Our farm is in Henry, and I'll eventually be getting one of these letters I'd bet.

My interest would lie more with letting us know what they plan on doing about private deer enclosures, as my bet is that that's where this whole jacked up mess started near Ames. And, I'll bet they know who it was. Tennessee hunters who own the resource have a right to know. I'd like to see them work as aggressively on that as they are taking out healthy deer.

Depredation permits are already issued for a lot of row crop farmers in West Tennessee. We have enough needless slaughter and extreme wanton waste there, and that's removing deer already near hot zones. If it's carcasses they want for testing, it shouldn't be any problem to gather them where they are rotting in fields, most likely gut shot by a farmer who'll probably be receiving an insurance claim anyway.

I see no need to jack up anything worse than already has been. That's not aimed at you Fairchaser. I respect you greatly.
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Ames took the approach that they couldn't simply allow the state to come in and slaughter every deer on the plantation. That was too extreme at the time. Since then however, our infection rate has crept higher and higher until the population is so low, you almost can't see any deer.

Maybe it would have been smarter to take our medicine early on. Because now we have a high infection rate that may persist for years and years. Hopefully not!

The idea is that you create a "sink" where healthier deer with lower infection come in from the outside area and repopulate your herd. This strategy only buys time though. There is no magic pill unfortunately.
 
fairchaser said:
Ames took the approach that they couldn't simply allow the state to come in and slaughter every deer on the plantation. That was too extreme at the time. Since then however, our infection rate has crept higher and higher until the population is so low, you almost can't see any deer.

Maybe it would have been smarter to take our medicine early on. Because now we have a high infection rate that may persist for years and years. Hopefully not!

The idea is that you create a "sink" where healthier deer with lower infection come in from the outside area and repopulate your herd. This strategy only buys time though. There is no magic pill unfortunately.
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If we were dealing with a hard line stoppage that would be created by killing en masse, then I could see that logic.

What they propose is only delaying the inevitable, and my thinking is that healthy deer filling the "sink" haven't been exposed to CWD. What makes more sense to me is that this disease is going to have to run it's course, kill what it chooses, and God willing, leave immune survivors that can repopulate and are immune to further infections from prion-tainted ground.

Repopulating with unexposed deer will probably delay that inevitability for way longer than needed.

That sounds like a harsh reality, but it pales in comparison to the harshness I feel toward the deer breeding industry since this disaster.
 
Lost Lake said:
If we were dealing with a hard line stoppage that would be created by killing en masse, then I could see that logic.

What they propose is only delaying the inevitable, and my thinking is that healthy deer filling the "sink" haven't been exposed to CWD. What makes more sense to me is that this disease is going to have to run it's course, kill what it chooses, and God willing, leave immune survivors that can repopulate and are immune to further infections from prion-tainted ground.

Repopulating with unexposed deer will probably delay that inevitability for way longer than needed.

That sounds like a harsh reality, but it pales in comparison to the harshness I feel toward the deer breeding industry since this disaster.
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Just so you know LL, CWD didn't get here from the escaping pen raised infectious deer. It got here from well meaning individuals who thought they could improve the genetics of their local deer by introducing pen raised deer into the herd. This was 20 years ago before it was well known that such a practice wouldn't work!

Regardless of how it got here, it would have gotten here sooner or later. I don't have any love for the deer breeding industry but they may have the solution for CWD through selective breeding of CWD resistant strains of deer.
 
I would like for them to show twra 1 deer thats CWD resistant, if they could they would be breeding them and selling as fast as they could, I haven't read that that has happened and I don't think it ever will, most of the herd will slowly dwindle till there are only pockets of deer without it, after some time they will be trapped and repopulate ares in hope that it has been buried or washed away, not going to happen in my hunting lifetime but maybe the grandkids will see the start of it
 
mike243 said:
I would like for them to show twra 1 deer thats CWD resistant, if they could they would be breeding them and selling as fast as they could, I haven't read that that has happened and I don't think it ever will, most of the herd will slowly dwindle till there are only pockets of deer without it, after some time they will be trapped and repopulate ares in hope that it has been buried or washed away, not going to happen in my hunting lifetime but maybe the grandkids will see the start of it
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The deer breeding association has already accomplished this. They now have resistant deer and some of those deer will be introduced into the Oklahoma deer herd. So, there's some hope.
 

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