Chronic wasting disease

[+cachew nut]

Chronic Wasting Disease

 

Sometimes I just like to read logs of caches around the country. I've seen a some notes about people seeing deer falling down, and others finding dead deer. How bad is it where you are from and have you witnessed this while geocaching?

 

[This message was edited by cachew nut on June 07, 2002 at 10:07 PM.]

[+bigredmed]

This is a serious threat to deer and other related animals (Elk, Moose, etc). If you are out caching and run across dead deer, especially recently dead deer, grab a location waypoint and let you local game and parks warden/sheriff know about it. We are watching it spread out of Colorado and Wyoming. Your find and your precise coordinates may assist your local agencies in tracking this disease in your state.

[+weezer]

I am figuring that you know about the Deer kill off that is going on in near by Wisconsin. They have found several carcases that tested positive for Cronic Waste Disease. So far there hasn't been any cases found in Illinois.

It is not uncommon to find dead deer in the forest preserves in Illinois. They are estimating that the deer population in the United States is larger than it has ever been.

 

Weezer

[+Ttepee]

Wow this is the first I've heard of this. I did come upon a freshly dead deer a couple of months back here in NY but had heard nothing about this at the time. Is this a nationwide epidemic?

[+weezer]

There have been other cases reported before, but it seemed more localized.

 

Wisconsin's approach may seem quite drastic, but I guess this may be the only way to control the disease. There aren't any kind of vaccines yet and there hasn't been any studies showing if there is a possible threat to humans. If I understand it right it is similar to mad cow disease.

 

Weezer

[+cachew nut]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ttepee:

Wow this is the first I've heard of this. I did come upon a freshly dead deer a couple of months back here in NY but had heard nothing about this at the time. Is this a nationwide epidemic?

---

 

http://www.cnn.com/HEALTH/9903/01/mystery.illness/index.html

 

http://www.dnr.state.wi.us/org/land/wildlife/whealth/issues/CWD/

[+briansnat]

I hate to say this, but in New Jersey, the more dead deer the better. They are nothing more than giant rats with hooves. They are destroying the understory in area forests, not to mention homeowner's plants. There are so many deer here that some towns are paying sharpshooters a lot of money to thin the herd. Funny, hunters would do it for free. Your tax dollars at work.

 

[This message was edited by BrianSnat on June 08, 2002 at 03:45 AM.]

[+cachew nut]

quote:

---

Originally posted by BrianSnat:

I hate to say this, but in New Jersey, the more dead deer the better. They are nothing more than giant rats with hooves. They are destroying the understory in area forests, not to mention homeowner's plants. There are so many deer here that some towns are paying sharpshooters a lot of money to thin the herd. Funny, hunters would do it for free. Your tax dollars at work.

---

 

The problem is eating the meat of these affected deer.

[+Spongebob]

They tried shooting the deer around here to control the population, but a bunch of people got upset, saying it was cruel to bait and shoot them. Now they just let the cars take care of the excess deer population. So far there has not been any sign of CWD in Western NY, but I imagine it will get here eventually.

[+weezer]

In many areas the only predator to deer is...Ford, GM, and all the other auto manufactures.

[+The GeoGadgets Team]

About fifteen years ago in Southern California the rangers were talking about something like this. When the deer population gets so high that a variety of foods for deer become slim, the deer begin to suffer from weak bones and other similar maladies. The ranger talked about how the deer were being found having worn their hooves off. Gone.

 

This is a problem of the lack of natural predators and too-strict hunting quotas. When every buck gets an opportunity to breed, because there are so many females that the lead bucks can't keep track of their territory and harams, the weaker deer reproduce and this kind of problem can run rampant.

 

Sad, because now the meat on over-abundant deer isn't edible. If proper land-husbandry had been implemented instead of letting the goodie-two-shoes, dirt-munching, tree-hugging, lily-livered city-dwelling do-gooders run things, this wouldn't be happening.

 

The end result? The deer population goes up (however temporarily), the number of predators will (historically) increase, then when the disease ravages the deer population, those predators will start heading into populated neighborhoods and killing dogs, cats and (gasp!) small people... then angry parents, those same folks who cry "Bambi's Mother!" everytime a deerhunter suits up, will demand retribution for the poor slob who didn't "do something about it earlier".

 

I'm rambling again... it's not the post count numbers, it's the length that matters! R-I-G-H-T-T-T...

 

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Lori aka: RedwoodRed

KF6VFI

"I don't get lost, I investigate alternative destinations."

GeoGadgets Team Website

Comics, Video Games and Movie Fansite

 

"Size matters not. Look at me. Judge me by my size, do you? Hmm? Hmm. And well you should not. For my ally is the Force, and a powerful ally it is." - Yoda, Jedi Master from Star Wars - Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back