Passport to Texas

Deer suffering from Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD).

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This is Passport to Texas

During its March meeting, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commissioners expanded the state’s chronic wasting disease (CWD) Panhandle Containment Zone. This action followed the discovery of CWD earlier this year in a roadkill white-tailed deer.

Texas Parks and Wildlife’s wildlife veterinarian, Dr. Bob Dittmar says: “The state’s wildlife disease management response… focuses on an early detection and containment strategy… designed to limit the spread of CWD from the affected area… and better understand the distribution and prevalence of the disease.”

The test positive roadkill was among more than 10-thousand deer, elk and other susceptible exotic game animal samples…collected from a variety of sources by Texas Parks and Wildlife Department personnel… for CWD testing during the 2017-18 collection year.

Of the samples, more than 2-thousand came from roadkill. The rest were obtained through mandatory and voluntary hunter harvest submissions.

Since 2012 when the state first discovered the disease among mule deer, Texas has recorded 100 confirmed cases of CWD.

Details about each CWD detection in Texas are available on Texas Parks and Wildlife web site.

The Wildlife Restoration program supports our series.

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

Deer with Chronic Wasting Disease

Chronic Wasting Disease Monitoring and Reporting Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is Passport to Texas

Chronic wasting disease, or CWD, is a neurological illness not known to affect humans…but is eventually fatal to infected deer.

Chronic wasting disease has been a concern in Texas since 2012 since the first discovery in the Trans Pecos.

Alan Cain is whitetail program leader at Texas Parks and Wildlife. Texas has three designated CWD zones:

West Texas, and one in the Panhandle, and one in South Central Texas. In each of those zones, it is mandatory sampling of hunter harvested deer, and also mandatory carcass movement restrictions. So, hunters are encouraged to go on our Parks and Wildlife website, and check out the CWD page, where they can find more information.

Although the agency requires hunters’ cooperation when monitoring CWD in the three zones—that shouldn’t stop anyone from getting into the field.

Sufficient rains and healthy habitat also boosted the mule deer populations in West Texas.

We’ve had some good rainfall out there in West Texas, and we expect hunters to have a good season out there, probably average, just as we’d expect for the whitetail deer hunting.

Whitetail season runs through January 7th in the North Zone and January 21 in the South Zone. Mule Deer season begins November 18 in the Panhandle, and November 24 in the Trans-Pecos.

Find CWD monitoring information on the Texas Parks and Wildlife website.

The Wildlife Restoration Program supports our series.

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

CWD Deer

TPW TV -- CWD Response Team Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is Passport to Texas

The first case of Chronic Wasting Disease, or CWD, was discovered in 2012 in free-ranging mule deer in an isolated area of far West Texas. Three years later…

2015 the sky fell out. They found a positive in a deer breeding facility.

CWD is a fatal, highly communicable neurological disease in deer. Ryan Shoeneberg is a wildlife program specialist, and part of Texas Parks and Wildlife’s CWD response team. The Texas Parks and Wildlife TV series on PBS features the team on this week’s show. Paul Crossley is a license and permit specialist on the team.

There is not treatment or cure. The only real management technique we have is containment.

This meant shutting down TWIMS—the Texas Wildlife Information Management Service—the central database used to manage deer breeding in Texas. It essentially halted the transfer of deer from breeding facilities, which affected people’s livelihoods.

Our job is to nip it at the bud. Find it like a cancer. Wall it off, and not let is spread out.

The team had the job of helping breeders get deer moving again.

We were essentially given a deadline that said, look, we’ve got to get deer breeders moving again. We’ve got to get commerce going again—by deer hunting season. I think it was 57 days.

The Texas Parks and Wildlife CWD Response TWIMS Reprogramming Team took action. Find out what they did this week on the Texas Parks and Wildlife TV series on PBS. Check your local listings. The Wildlife restoration program support our series.

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

Deer suffering from Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD).

Monitoring for Chronic Wasting Disease Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is Passport to Texas

The outlook for deer season is outstanding thanks to plentiful rainfall. White-tail program leader, Alan Cain.

The rainfall that’s been very prevalent across the state this year, has also provided great vegetation for the mule deer and the pronghorn out there in West Texas. Hunters that are out there pursuing mule deer and pronghorn will have an excellent year [too].

To maintain healthy herds, biologists want hunters to help monitor deer for Chronic Wasting Disease [CWD]—a neurological disease that kills deer, but has no known effect on humans.

Chronic wasting disease has been a concern in Texas since 2012—since the first discovery in the trans Pecos. We also had a new positive discovered in the Panhandle this past hunting season 2015.

Texas Parks and Wildlife created mandatory containment and surveillance zones for Chronic Wasting Disease testing and rules for transporting harvested deer in parts of west Texas.

Hunters in those Chronic Wasting Disease zones that harvest a deer, are required to bring those deer to the check stations so our staff can pull a CWD sample. We do have another CWD zone in portions of Medina, Uvalde and Bandera counties; and that is a voluntary surveillance zone. So, we would appreciate all the help we can get from our hunters out there to bring deer in so we can monitor for CWD.

Find more information on the Texas Parks and Wildlife website.

The Wildlife restoration program supports our series.

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

Will Chronic Wasting Disease Affect Hunting? Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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.