The Wildlife News

CWD

  • Predators – The Missing Link in the Explosion of CWD

    Jonathan Ratner

    Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) is a prion-based disease that is basically human created/human exacerbated. CWD, like all the other prion-based diseases like Mad Cow, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) are 100% fatal and unlike bacterial and viral disease agents, prions are extremely difficult to neutralize. Normal autoclave methods and incineration are ineffective at rendering prions not infectious.…

  • A Wyoming mule deer herd is so riddled with CWD it could nearly vanish

    Jonathan Ratner

    Editor’s note: The following is republished from WyoFile, an excellent source of in-depth reporting on Wyoming issues. by Mike Koshmrl of www.WyoFile.com June 24, 2024 Preliminary findings have biologists worried for superinfected deer herd. There’s hope research could help guide chronic wasting disease management — if the public lets it happen. WIND RIVER VALLEY—Biologists Tucker…

  • Conservationists Protest Disease-spreading Elk Feeding in the Gros Ventre

    Ralph Maughan

    Feeding continues even as chronic wasting disease moves closer- Jackson, WY – Yesterday afternoon, a coalition of four conservation groups filed formal objections to the Bridger-Teton National Forest’s recent decision approving an elk feeding ground in Wyoming’s Gros Ventre Valley. They are Western Watersheds Project, Wilderness Watch, Wyoming Chapter of Sierra Club, and the Gallatin Wildlife Association. The…

  • Controversy in Idaho Legislature over the threat posed by the meningeal worm to elk, mule deer, and moose

    Ralph Maughan

    Elk breeders push to relax rules. Legislature close to rejecting the breeders- White-tailed deer and the parasitic meningeal worm (Parelaphostrongylus tenuis) coexist fairly well. They have fought each other to a near standstill in evolutionary conflict spanning perhaps a million years. The whitetails rarely get sick from these adult nematode type worms that live in…

  • Chronic wasting disease now rings Greater Yellowstone in Wyoming

    Ralph Maughan

    How much longer before the feedlots are hit? Nightmare “mad elk” or “mad deer” disease, the always lethal malady spread by prions (infectious proteins), keeps creeping ever closer the the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem in Wyoming and to the massive elk winter feedlots. In these, it is expected to spread like wildfire in cheatgrass. According to…

  • Cause of spread of "mad elk", "mad deer" disease found

    Ralph Maughan

    It’s in their droppings, and the infectious prions never go away! Really, really bad news about chronic wasting disease.  Study Spells Out Spread of Brain Illness in Animals. By Sandra Blakeslee. New York Times. “Dr. Aiken said prions tended to bind to clay in soil and to persist indefinitely. When deer graze on infected dirt,…

  • How did moose get CWD? Star Valley deer, elk likely have the disease as well.

    Ralph Maughan

    Damn!! In the Greater Yellowstone and on the Idaho border- How did moose get CWD? Star Valley deer, elk likely have the disease as well. By Cory Hatch, Jackson Hole News and Guide. Maybe Idaho should sue Wyoming for wildlife malpractice?

  • Chronic Wasting Disease issue heats up in Wyoming

    Ralph Maughan

    Infected moose in SW of Jackson, plus Forest Service renewal of elk feedgrounds and doubledealing stoke the issue- Wildlife disease debate heats up. By Chris Merrill.  Casper Star-Tribune environment reporter. I have this feeling that the Forest Service and Wyoming Game and Fish are about as trusty as sub-prime mortgage investments. Update. Oct. 22, 2008. Groups…

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