DNR Confirms CWD Detected In Marquette County
The CWD-Positive Wild Deer Harvested During 2019 Nine-Day Gun Deer Hunting Season
Contact(s): Ellen Barth, Wildlife Area Supervisor920-424-4003, Ellen.Barth@wisconsin.gov
Jeff Pritzl, Wildlife District Supervisor, 920-662-5127, Jeffrey.Pritzl@wisconsin.gov
January 23, 2020 at 8:09:20 am
[EDITOR'S ADVISORY: This news release has been updated to correct that this was the third CWD positive for Marquette County in 2019, not the second as previously stated.]
OSHKOSH, Wis. - The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources confirms that a wild deer tested positive for chronic wasting disease (CWD) in Buffalo Township in Marquette County. The CWD-positive deer was an adult doe harvested during the 2019 nine-day gun deer season and was tested as part of the DNR's disease surveillance efforts. This is the third wild deer that tested positive for CWD in Marquette County, and its location is also within 10 miles of adjacent Green Lake and Columbia counties. The first detection was during the 2018 deer season.
State law requires that the DNR enact a ban on baiting and feeding of deer in counties or portions of counties within a 10-mile radius of a wild or farm-raised deer that tests positive for CWD or tuberculosis. Marquette, Green Lake and Columbia counties are already identified as CWD affected counties and already have baiting and feeding bans in place. As required by law, this new CWD-positive detection will renew a three-year baiting and feeding ban in Marquette County and a two-year ban in Green Lake County. Columbia County will renew a three-year ban due to wild deer CWD positive detections within the county.
"We are committed to working closely with local communities, including the citizen-based County Deer Advisory Councils as we explore future management options for this disease in Marquette and the surrounding counties," said Ellen Barth, DNR wildlife area supervisor.
In response to the detection of this CWD-positive wild deer, the DNR will:
- Work with local County Deer Advisory Council members from the counties impacted by this detection during regularly scheduled CDAC meetings in March to discuss response actions, including the issuance of CWD surveillance permits.
- Determine surveillance activities to assess disease distribution and prevalence will also include:
- Encouraging reporting of sick deer
- Sampling vehicle-killed adult deer when feasible
- Sampling adult deer harvested under agricultural damage permits
- Encourage hunters to utilize deer carcass waste disposal options.
- Encourage hunters to follow recommendations to help prevent the spread of CWD.
Chronic wasting disease is a fatal, infectious nervous system disease of deer, moose, elk and reindeer/caribou. It belongs to the family of diseases known as transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs) or prion diseases. CWD occurs only in members of the cervid or deer family - both wild and captive. The Wisconsin DNR began monitoring the state's wild white-tailed deer population for CWD in 1999. The first positives were found in 2002.
For more information regarding baiting and feeding regulations and CWD in Wisconsin and for information on how to have deer tested during the 2019-20 hunting seasons, visit the DNR's baiting and feeding and CWD sampling webpages respectively.