Carroll County has the third highest prevalence of Chronic Wasting Disease in Arkansas with 122 white-tailed deer testing positive for CWD since the disease was initially discovered in Newton County in February 2016, according to figures from the Arkansas Game & Fish Commission. Boone County has had 165 cases and Newton County eclipses all other counties with 613 cases.
Cory Gray, chief of the research division, AG&F, said while Carroll County has one of the higher prevalence counts in the state, that doesn’t necessarily mean that CWD is getting worse.
“We can’t say it is increasing,” Gray said in a telephone interview. “We are becoming better at detecting it and have increased surveillance efforts. We can say hunters are submitting more samples and we are becoming more efficient at identifying positives. It is a slow-moving disease so it is appropriate to analyze disease prevalence in multi-year segments versus year-by-year.”
According to AG&F, CWD is a fatal neurological disease that affects members of the deer/elk family (cervids), similar to scrapie in sheep/goats and mad cow disease in cattle. These diseases are caused by misshapen proteins called prions, which accumulate in the tissues of affected animals, especially the brain, spinal cord, and lymph nodes. Infected animals will not show signs of disease for a long period of time, but late in the disease process, they will be thin and may demonstrate weakness, abnormal behavior, excessive thirst, or drooling.
Statewide 1,060 white tailed deer have tested positive since sampling began. That is still a small percentage of the 32,217 tested during that time period.
“A vast majority of the harvested deer are still safe to eat, but we always encourage hunters to have their animals tested,” Gray said. “It provides us data, but it also gives a sense of assurance to hunters that they aren’t feeding any CWD positive deer to their families. We have free testing from the beginning to the end of the season in every county in the state. We try to make it as easy as possible for hunters to submit their deer samples. We want to make sure hunters continue hunting and that they enjoy the resource. We need hunters to continue to deer hunt; hunting deer is probably one of the greatest actions in CWD management.”
There is no proof that eating venison from CWD can cause human illness, but it is not recommended. One speculation is the disease could be affecting the desire of hunters to harvest deer in Carroll County. That hit a high of 2,012 in 2016 before declining to 1,599 in 2017, 1,888 in 2018, 1,608 in 2019 and 1,327 in 2020. But, according to a survey conducted in 2017 by the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, 78 percent of hunters surveyed who hunt in Carroll County and other high disease prevalence counties stated they were very likely to hunt in the upcoming deer season. The decline in Carroll County’s deer harvest may not be as simple as disease prevalence, but a complex mix of other factors.
Hunting seasons for archery normally begin in late September, with muzzleloader season beginning in late October, and modern gun hunting running from early November to early January.
More than 200,000 deer are harvested annually in Arkansas.
“It is an important food source,” Gray said. “Hunting is very popular in the state. It is the number one big-game animal in the state. Nearly 90 percent of hunting license holders hunt deer. Venison helps with food stability, but also with population management. Hunting is our number one tool for deer management.”
CWD has also been found in the elk population in Newton County, but the prevalence of disease is not nearly as high as with deer.
“We don’t test as many elk,” Gray said. “We’ve tested 456 elk, and out of those we have 30 positives.” That is since 2016.
Social distancing applies to deer, too
Eureka Springs has a large population of deer in town. Some deer are so tame that they show little fear of humans and sometimes even take their time getting out of the road. While feeding deer has been banned, there have been reports of feeding continuing.
Gray said anything that congregates deer increases the risk of them contracting and spreading not just CWD, but hemorrhagic disease and tick-borne illnesses. CWD is spread by saliva, feces, blood or urine, either through direct contact or indirectly through contamination of food or soil.
“You don’t want to congregate any animals,” Gray said. “Apply the same concept to how we are managing coronavirus in humans including social distancing and not gathering in large numbers. You use the same practices when fighting disease and illness in deer.”
There is recent research indicating that deer exposed to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus that causes Covid-19, can contract and transmit the disease, according to the Journal of Virology.
There is concern that the large number of deer in town could be vectors of tick-borne illnesses.
“Deer could very well be carrying ticks into the city limits,” Gray said. “As you attract deer within the city limits, you could be inflating the number of ticks in your residential areas.”
Gray said that deer have few predators in urban areas. Sometimes the biggest “predator” is the automobile.
“Deer tend to survive longer in town and they are highly productive,” Gray said. “Some deer never leave town to be vulnerable to being harvested. Town deer tend to push boundaries. We all enjoy them seeing them but, the next thing you know, they are causing damage either to our gardens or vehicles. Then they are not as enjoyable.”
According to State Farm Insurance, Arkansas is a high-risk state for collisions with deer with a one in 80 chance per year of a collision. State Farm said there were about 1.9 million animal collision insurance claims in the U.S. between July 1, 2019 and June 30, 2020. The average claim is more than $4,000.
More information about CWD is available at the website agfc.com. The agency asks anyone who observed CWD symptoms in a deer contract AG&F so a sample can be obtained.