Passport to Texas

This is Passport to Texas

When news of Chronic Wasting Disease—or CWD—in a captive breeding population in Medina County surfaced in June 2015, TPW had a management strategy ready to go.

14—Once we got this positive, we began the implementation of that management strategy that we’ve had in place. We immediately restricted movement of all captive deer in Texas until we could do a risk assessment and determine the prevalence of this disease.

Steve Lightfoot, Texas Parks and Wildlife spokesman, said careful monitoring of Texas white-tailed deer continues. Meantime, in case anyone’s been worried, hunters need not change their plans this fall.

36— We don’t foresee any changes in how hunters across the state of Texas conduct business this fall. We anticipate that it’s going to be excellent hunting conditions; we’ve got recent rainfall that’s pretty much turned the landscape around. Deer are in healthy shape. And so, right now this is an epidemiological investigation into one deer, in one breeder facility, in one country in Texas. So, I would encourage folks to go about the business of enjoying this wonderful heritage that we’ve got in Texas that’s deer hunting. There are 750-thousand deer hunters. Four million animals. It’s a great opportunity to get out there and enjoy it. Don’t let this deter it.

Find CWD and fall hunting information on the Texas Parks and Wildlife website.

The Wildlife and Sport Fish Restoration Program supports our series, and funds more than 40 million dollars in conservation efforts in Texas annually through your purchases of hunting and fishing equipment, and motorboat fuels.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife, I’m Cecilia Nasti.