Game Farm, CWD Concerns Rise at Boone and Crockett Club
Friday, March 28, 2014 Concerned about captive deer operations transmitting diseases to wild herds, the Boone and Crockett Club now officially supports state bans on commercial import and export of deer or elk.
The Club also opposes efforts to relax regulation of captive cervid breeding operations or to remove management authority over such operations from state wildlife agencies.
A full position statement, posted here, was passed at the Club’s December meeting.
The Club’s concerns were reinforced at the recent Whitetail Summit hosted by the Quality Deer Management Association (QDMA), the first summit to focus on key issues and challenges facing free-ranging white-tailed deer.
“Of all the presentations, seminars and findings, I was most pleased to see the attention given to the connections between chronic wasting disease (CWD) and the game farming industry. This has been on our radar, and on the radar of QDMA, other conservation groups, state agencies and sportsmen for quite some time,” said Richard Hale, chairman of the Club’s Records Committee.
Hale added, “Congratulations to QDMA on one of the most impressive and well-run summits I’ve had the pleasure of attending and for keeping this issue front and center.”
CWD is a degenerative brain disease that affects elk, mule deer, white-tailed deer, and moose. The disease can be transmitted by direct animal-to-animal contact through saliva, feces and urine, and indirectly through environmental contamination. CWD is fatal in deer, elk and moose, but there is no evidence that CWD can be transmitted to humans, according to the CDC and The World Health Organization.
Documented cases of CWD have been found in captive and/or wild deer and elk in 22 states and two Canadian provinces. In some, but not all, cases where the disease has been found in wild populations, the disease is present in captive populations within these regions.
In 2002, the Boone and Crockett Club, Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation and the Mule Deer Foundation formed the CWD Alliance. Its purpose was to pool resources, share information and collaborate on ways to positively address the CWD issue. Other organizations have since joined the Alliance, including QDMA and the Wildlife Management Institute, which now administers the Alliance website
www.cwd-info.org.“Evidence strongly suggests that captive animals infected with CWD can serve as the source for the spread of the disease to other captive animals, and between captive animals and wild populations,” said Hale. “To reduce the risk to wild deer populations, several states passed laws prohibiting game farming or live captive deer and elk importation, but now they are fighting efforts to expand captive deer and elk breeding and shooting operations within their jurisdictions. The captive cervid industry is persistent in proposing new legislations to overturn these laws, or transfer the authority of captive deer and elk from state fish and game agencies to their respective departments of agriculture.”
No vaccine or treatment is available for animals infected with CWD and once established in a population, culling or complete depopulation to eradicate CWD has provided only marginal results. In fact, the prevalence of CWD is rising at an alarming rate in some infected wild deer populations. Prevention is the only truly effective technique for managing diseases in free-ranging wildlife populations. Consequently, what can be done is minimizing the spread of CWD by restricting intra- and interstate transportation captive, privately owned wildlife, which frequently occurs in game farming.
http://www.boone-crockett.org/news/featured_story.asp?area=news&ID=204 boone and crockett club position statement
REGULATION OF GAME FARMS First Adopted December 7, 2013 - Updated December 7, 2013
Situational Overview
The captive cervid industry, also referred to as game farming, uses artificial means to breed captive deer, elk, and other cervids for sale in shooting preserve operations. These game farms commonly transport captive deer and elk to other shooting preserves in a state or in other states.
Transportation of captive, game farm animals has been shown to increase the risk of spreading parasites and infectious, diseases, such as chronic wasting disease (CWD) and bovine tuberculosis, to other captive and wild cervids in new locations. There is currently no way of testing live animals for CWD, and infected animals show no signs for at least 16-18 months post-infection. There is no vaccine, and despite fenced enclosures, captive animals often come in contact with wild populations thereby spreading diseases. Once CWD is present, the area cannot be decontaminated even if infected animals are removed. As a result, many states have banned or are attempting to ban the importation of captive cervids (as well as intact carcasses of hunter-killed, wild cervids) to lower the risk of spreading CWD and other infectious diseases.
Position
The Boone and Crockett Club supports state bans on importing or exporting captive deer and elk by game farming operations in order to protect the health of native populations. The Club opposes any legislation aimed at relaxing regulations governing captive cervid breeding operations or removing management authority over such operations from state wildlife agencies. The Club does not oppose the transportation of wild cervids by state agencies and non-governmental organizations for the purpose of re-establishing wild game animals to their historic, open ranges.
The breeding of captive deer, elk, and other cervids for profit to create abnormally large “trophy” animals for fenced shoots under non-fair chase conditions are addressed in the Boone and Crockett Club’s positions on “Genetic Manipulation of Game” and “Canned Shoots.”
http://www.boone-crockett.org/about/posi...p;se=1&te=1 Sunday, April 06, 2014
The Conservation Federation of Missouri is Opposed to the Transfer of Captive White-tailed Deer Management
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2014/04/the-conservation-federation-of-missouri.htmlTHE LANCET Infectious Diseases Vol 3 August 2003
Tracking spongiform encephalopathies in North America
http://download.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/laninf/PIIS1473309903007151.pdf?id=baa1CkXPkhI3Ih_Vlh6ru Friday, December 14, 2012
DEFRA U.K. What is the risk of Chronic Wasting Disease CWD being introduced into Great Britain? A Qualitative Risk Assessment October 2012
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In the USA, under the Food and Drug Administration’s BSE Feed Regulation (21 CFR 589.2000) most material (exceptions include milk, tallow, and gelatin) from deer and elk is prohibited for use in feed for ruminant animals. With regards to feed for non-ruminant animals, under FDA law, CWD positive deer may not be used for any animal feed or feed ingredients. For elk and deer considered at high risk for CWD, the FDA recommends that these animals do not enter the animal feed system. However, this recommendation is guidance and not a requirement by law.
Animals considered at high risk for CWD include:
1) animals from areas declared to be endemic for CWD and/or to be CWD eradication zones and
2) deer and elk that at some time during the 60-month period prior to slaughter were in a captive herd that contained a CWD-positive animal.
Therefore, in the USA, materials from cervids other than CWD positive animals may be used in animal feed and feed ingredients for non-ruminants.
The amount of animal PAP that is of deer and/or elk origin imported from the USA to GB can not be determined, however, as it is not specified in TRACES. It may constitute a small percentage of the 8412 kilos of non-fish origin processed animal proteins that were imported from US into GB in 2011.
Overall, therefore, it is considered there is a __greater than negligible risk___ that (nonruminant) animal feed and pet food containing deer and/or elk protein is imported into GB.
There is uncertainty associated with this estimate given the lack of data on the amount of deer and/or elk protein possibly being imported in these products.
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36% in 2007 (Almberg et al., 2011). In such areas, population declines of deer of up to 30 to 50% have been observed (Almberg et al., 2011). In areas of Colorado, the prevalence can be as high as 30% (EFSA, 2011).
The clinical signs of CWD in affected adults are weight loss and behavioural changes that can span weeks or months (Williams, 2005). In addition, signs might include excessive salivation, behavioural alterations including a fixed stare and changes in interaction with other animals in the herd, and an altered stance (Williams, 2005). These signs are indistinguishable from cervids experimentally infected with bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE).
Given this, if CWD was to be introduced into countries with BSE such as GB, for example, infected deer populations would need to be tested to differentiate if they were infected with CWD or BSE to minimise the risk of BSE entering the human food-chain via affected venison.
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The rate of transmission of CWD has been reported to be as high as 30% and can approach 100% among captive animals in endemic areas (Safar et al., 2008).
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In summary, in endemic areas, there is a medium probability that the soil and surrounding environment is contaminated with CWD prions and in a bioavailable form. In rural areas where CWD has not been reported and deer are present, there is a greater than negligible risk the soil is contaminated with CWD prion.
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In summary, given the volume of tourists, hunters and servicemen moving between GB and North America, the probability of at least one person travelling to/from a CWD affected area and, in doing so, contaminating their clothing, footwear and/or equipment prior to arriving in GB is greater than negligible. For deer hunters, specifically, the risk is likely to be greater given the increased contact with deer and their environment. However, there is significant uncertainty associated with these estimates.
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Therefore, it is considered that farmed and park deer may have a higher probability of exposure to CWD transferred to the environment than wild deer given the restricted habitat range and higher frequency of contact with tourists and returning GB residents.
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http://www.defra.gov.uk/animal-diseases/files/qra_chronic-wasting-disease-121029.pdf Singeltary submission ;
Program Standards: Chronic Wasting Disease Herd Certification Program and Interstate Movement of Farmed or Captive Deer, Elk, and Moose
*** DOCUMENT ID: APHIS-2006-0118-0411
http://www.regulations.gov/#!documentDetail;D=APHIS-2006-0118-0411
Saturday, March 29, 2014
Game Farm, CWD Concerns Rise at Boone and Crockett Club
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2014/03/game-farm-cwd-concerns-rise-at-boone.htmlWednesday, September 04, 2013
*** cwd - cervid captive livestock escapes, loose and on the run in the wild
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2013/09/cwd-cervid-captive-livestock-escapes.html *** Spraker suggested an interesting explanation for the occurrence of CWD. The deer pens at the Foot Hills Campus were built some 30-40 years ago by a Dr. Bob Davis. At or abut that time, allegedly, some scrapie work was conducted at this site. When deer were introduced to the pens they occupied ground that had previously been occupied by sheep. ...
also, see where even decades back, the USDA had the same thought as they do today with CWD, not their problem...see page 27 below as well, where USDA stated back then, the same thing they stated in the state of Pennsylvania, not their damn business, once they escape, and they said the same thing about CWD in general back then ;
”The occurrence of CWD must be viewed against the contest of the locations in which it occurred. It was an incidental and unwelcome complication of the respective wildlife research programmes. Despite it’s subsequent recognition as a new disease of cervids, therefore justifying direct investigation, no specific research funding was forthcoming. The USDA veiwed it as a wildlife problem and consequently not their province!” ...page 26.
http://collections.europarchive.org/tna/20080102193705/http://www.bseinquiry.gov.uk/files/mb/m11b/tab01.pdf
”The occurrence of CWD must be viewed against the contest of the locations in which it occurred. It was an incidental and unwelcome complication of the respective wildlife research programmes. Despite it’s subsequent recognition as a new disease of cervids, therefore justifying direct investigation, no specific research funding was forthcoming. The USDA veiwed it as a wildlife problem and consequently not their province!” ...page 26.
sound familiar $$$
Sunday, January 06, 2013
USDA TO PGC ONCE CAPTIVES ESCAPE
*** "it‘s no longer its business.”
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2013/01/usda-to-pgc-once-captives-escape-its-no.html Saturday, June 29, 2013
PENNSYLVANIA CAPTIVE CWD INDEX HERD MATE YELLOW *47 STILL RUNNING LOOSE IN INDIANA, YELLOW NUMBER 2 STILL MISSING, AND OTHERS ON THE RUN STILL IN LOUISIANA
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2013/06/pennsylvania-captive-cwd-index-herd.html Tuesday, May 28, 2013
Chronic Wasting Disease CWD quarantine Louisiana via CWD index herd Pennsylvania Update May 28, 2013
*** 6 doe from Pennsylvania CWD index herd still on the loose in Louisiana, quarantine began on October 18, 2012, still ongoing, Lake Charles premises.
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2013/05/chronic-wasting-disease-cwd-quarantine.html Thursday, October 03, 2013
*** TAHC ADOPTS CWD RULE THAT the amendments REMOVE the requirement for a specific fence height for captives
Texas Animal Health Commission (TAHC)
ANNOUNCEMENT
October 3, 2013
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2013/10/tahc-adopts-cwd-rule-that-amendments.html Monday, March 03, 2014
*** APHIS to Offer Indemnity for CWD Positive Herds as Part of Its Cervid Health Activities ???
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2014/03/aphis-to-offer-indemnity-for-cwd.html Saturday, February 04, 2012
*** Wisconsin 16 age limit on testing dead deer Game Farm CWD Testing Protocol Needs To Be Revised
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2012/02/wisconsin-16-age-limit-on-testing-dead.html Sunday, November 3, 2013
*** Environmental Impact Statements; Availability, etc.: Animal Carcass Management [Docket No. APHIS-2013-0044]
http://transmissiblespongiformencephalop...statements.html Sunday, September 01, 2013
*** hunting over gut piles and CWD TSE prion disease
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2013/09/hunting-over-gut-piles-and-cwd-tse.html Monday, October 07, 2013
The importance of localized culling in stabilizing chronic wasting disease prevalence in white-tailed deer populations
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-importance-of-localized-culling-in.html Friday, March 07, 2014
37th Annual Southeast Deer Study Group Meeting in Athens, Georgia (CWD TSE Prion abstracts)
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2014/03/37th-annual-southeast-deer-study-group.htmlSaturday, March 15, 2014
Potential role of soil properties in the spread of CWD in western Canada
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2014/03/potential-role-of-soil-properties-in.html Inactivation of the TSE Prion disease
Chronic Wasting Disease CWD, and other TSE prion disease, these TSE prions know no borders.
these TSE prions know no age restrictions.
The TSE prion disease survives ashing to 600 degrees celsius, that’s around 1112 degrees farenheit.
you cannot cook the TSE prion disease out of meat.
you can take the ash and mix it with saline and inject that ash into a mouse, and the mouse will go down with TSE.
Prion Infected Meat-and-Bone Meal Is Still Infectious after Biodiesel Production as well.
the TSE prion agent also survives Simulated Wastewater Treatment Processes.
IN fact, you should also know that the TSE Prion agent will survive in the environment for years, if not decades.
you can bury it and it will not go away.
The TSE agent is capable of infected your water table i.e. Detection of protease-resistant cervid prion protein in water from a CWD-endemic area.
it’s not your ordinary pathogen you can just cook it out and be done with. that’s what’s so worrisome about Iatrogenic mode of transmission, a simple autoclave will not kill this TSE prion agent.
Sunday, March 30, 2014
*** Chronic Wasting Disease Agents in Nonhuman Primates ***
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2014/03/chronic-wasting-disease-agents-in.html *** our results raise the possibility that CJD cases classified as VV1 may include cases caused by iatrogenic transmission of sCJD-MM1 prions or food-borne infection by type 1 prions from animals, e.g., chronic wasting disease prions in cervid. In fact, two CJD-VV1 patients who hunted deer or consumed venison have been reported (40, 41). The results of the present study emphasize the need for traceback studies and careful re-examination of the biochemical properties of sCJD-VV1 prions. ***
http://www.jbc.org/cgi/content/abstract/...ourcetype=HWCIT Thursday, January 2, 2014
*** CWD TSE Prion in cervids to hTGmice, Heidenhain Variant Creutzfeldt-Jacob Disease MM1 genotype, and iatrogenic CJD ??? ***
http://transmissiblespongiformencephalop...to-htgmice.html OLD HISTORY ON CWD AND GAME FARMS IN USA
http://www.mad-cow.org/june_98_end.html http://www.mad-cow.org/99feb_cwd_special.html#ggg http://www.mad-cow.org/99feb_cwd_special.html http://www.mad-cow.org/00/dec00_cwd.html http://www.mad-cow.org/00/dec00_cwd.html#bbb http://www.mad-cow.org/cwd_cattle.html http://www.mad-cow.org/00/archive_frame.html Terry S. Singeltary Sr.
