Pennsylvania Game News - October 2022 - 24

THE FACTS ON CWD
CWD is a TSE, or transmissible spongiform
encephalopathy, infecting cervids, including
white-tailed deer and elk. It's related to mad
cow disease in cattle and scrapie in sheep
and goats, and likewise kills every animal that
contracts it.
With CWD, misshapen proteins called
prions develop and damage an animal's brain.
That leads to poor body condition, excessive
drinking, urination, salivation and drooling,
and behavioral and neurologic changes such
as repetitive walking patterns, droopy ears, a
wide-based stance, and listlessness. Some animals
lose their fear of humans and predators.
All that - or heightened susceptibility to
other diseases or predation resulting from
CWD - kills deer. It can be a long time from
infection to death, though. Animals with
CWD may not exhibit symptoms for 18 to 24
months.
Discovered in mule deer at a captive
research facility in Colorado in 1967, CWD was
long confined to the West but crossed the Mississippi
into Wisconsin in 2002, then showed
up in New York and West Virginia in 2005 and
Virginia and Maryland in 2010.
How it got into Pennsylvania is unclear.
" There is no way to know for sure, " said
Andrea Korman, the Game Commission's
Chronic Wasting Disease Section Supervisor.
It wasn't just always here, as some suggest,
though, Korman noted. The Game Commission
began looking for it in 1998 and went 14
years without detecting it.
At the same time, it's unlikely, given the
distance between them, that the captive
CWD-positive deer in Adams County 10 years
ago infected the wild CWD-positive deer in
Bedford and Blair, or vice versa, she added.
To help slow the spread of CWD, hunters
within the state's DMAs are prohibited from
transporting the high-risk parts of deer outside
the DMA's boundaries. The same rules apply
in the state's EA; when a deer is harvested
there, its high-risk parts must be removed
and properly discarded within the defined
boundary before the meat and other low-risk
parts are exported.
High-risk parts include the head (including
brain, tonsils, eyes and any lymph nodes);
spinal cord/backbone; spleen, any thing
containing visible brain or spinal cord tissue;
unfinished taxidermy mounts; and braintanned
hides.
24
they should do with others.
Consider that:
* The Game Commission initially
created two Disease Management Areas
(DMAs) - DMA 1 in Adams County, then
DMA 2 in Bedford and Blair - to slow the
spread of CWD. Within DMAs, the use
or possession of cervid urine-based attractants
are prohibited, as are the feeding or
rehabilitation of wild deer and the movement
of high-risk parts beyond them.
* The Game Commission later dissolved
DMA 1 after five years without any
further CWD-positive detections. DMA 2
continues to expand, though, and is now
the state's largest, taking in nearly 8,100
square miles.
* Then there's the Established Area.
That's a subsection of DMA 2 accounting
for 90% or more of all the state's CWDpositive
cases to date. Regulations there
prohibit moving high-risk parts even into
the rest of DMA 2.
* Meanwhile, the detection of additional
CWD-positive deer in new places
necessitated the creation of four additional
DMAs: 3, 4, 5 and 6. Combined
with DMA 2, they take in roughly 24%
of Pennsylvania's land mass, or almost
11,300 square miles.
* In all of those DMAs and the EA, the
Game Commission puts out bins where
hunters can drop off the heads from deer
they harvest - double-bagged with the tag
attached - to be tested for CWD for free.
Hunters can access results online or by
calling 1-833-INFOCWD.
* The Game Commission recommends
that deer testing CWD-positive should be
discarded. Replacement tags are available.
* And how's this for evolution? Hunters
were once prohibited from bringing
back high-risk parts from deer, elk, moose
and other cervids if those animals were
harvested in states or provinces known to
Pennsylvania Game News - October 2022

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