CWD found in deer shot north of Chester

Havre Daily News staff

A degenerative disease never found in wild game in Montana before this fall now has been confirmed in the Golden Triangle.

Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks said Tuesday that chronic wasting disease was confirmed in a buck mule deer shot Nov. 12 north of Chester near the Canadian border.

FWP Region 4 Public Information Officer Bruce Auchly said this morning that the disease was confirmed Monday to be in the deer, and the agency is still working on its response plans.

Four deer with the disease were harvested this fall south of Billings. Auchly said that region, FWP Region 5, is taking the lead on dealing with the discovery of the disease.

“We are following that,” he said.

FWP Wildlife Biologist Scott Hemmer said that prior to this year, the only cases of the disease in Montana were found in deer in a game farm near Phiillipsburg in 1999. The confirmations this year are the first time the disease has been found in wild animals in Motnana, he said.

The disease exists in wild herds in Wyoming, North and South Dakota and Saskatchewan and Alberta in Canada.

Chronic wasting disease is a progressive, fatal disease infecting the nervous system of mule deer, white-tailed deer, elk and moose. It can only be effectively detected in samples from dead animals. Auchly said the only way to confirm its presence is through testing the animal’s brain..

He said the disease is not known to be transmittable to humans, but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends deer harvested in an area that has the disease be tested before people eat them.

If hunters harvest an animal that appears to be sick, the best thing to do is contact FWP and have the animal inspected. If the animal appears to be sick, Auchly said, FWP disposes of it and provides a new tag to the hunter.

The FWP release said people should take some simple precautions when field dressing deer, elk or moose, including

• Wear rubber gloves and eye protection when field dressing.

• Minimize the handling of brain and spinal tissues.

• Wash hands and instruments thoroughly after field dressing is completed.

• Avoid consuming brain, spinal cord, eyes, spleen, tonsils and lymph nodes of harvested animals. Normal field dressing coupled with boning out of a carcass will essentially remove these parts.

For more information on CWD and FWP’s response, people can look online at http://fwp.mt.gov/cwd and can email [email protected].

After the detection of the disease south of Billings, FWP updated its response plan for the disease and Director Martha Williams created an incident command team to respond to the detection there. FWP is now putting together a team to respond to the detection north of Chester.

Auchly said the incident command team that will be established to investigate the area where the deer was shot, will try to find out the exact area from which the deer came. It will then get an estimate of the population of the deer in that region, the initial response area, and determine how many deer will need to be sampled to find how prevalent the disease is.

He said the Region 5 command team has organized a hunt to respond to the detections in south-central Montana, which will come before the Montana Fish and Wildlife Commission at their meeting Thursday in Helena for final approval.

He said animals will have to sampled from the area, but no specific hunt has been planned yet.

“We’re still working out the details,” he said. “Thats some pretty rugged country and anything would have to be approved by the commission.[

He said it is almost certain no hunts would be held before January, but something will have to be done.

“We will have to take deer,” Auchly said. “How we do it and where we still have to figure out.”

He said landowners in the IRA will be heavily involved in the process.

“We should have an estimate on the population pretty quick, then we will draw the IRA,” Auchly said. “Then we will have a better idea how many deer need to be sampled and where and by whom.”