NEBRASKAland Magazine is dedicated to outstanding photography and informative writing with an engaging mix of articles and photos highlighting Nebraska’s outdoor activities, parklands, wildlife, history and people.
Issue link: http://mag.outdoornebraska.gov/i/581251
NOVEMBER 2015 • NEBRASKAland 31 Colorado lab. The first positive tests in the wild came from Colorado: elk in 1981 and mule deer in 1985. It is now found in captive and wild deer and elk in 24 states and two Canadian provinces. Nebraska began testing for the disease in 1997, and its first positive case came in 2000 from a mule deer in Kimball County. In all, 48,000 deer and elk have been tested in Nebraska, with 286 positives from 28 counties in the western two-thirds of the state, with the highest rates in the northwestern corner of the Panhandle, parts of Kimball County and an area of the Sandhills southeast of Alliance. The natural movement of deer, especially the dispersal of yearling bucks from their home range each spring, is fueling the spread of CWD and other diseases. Many states, including Nebraska, have tried to reduce deer herds to slow the spread of the disease, with little success. Prevalence rates in some parts of Wyoming have reached 50 percent of hunter-killed, road- killed and targeted animals. Deer can carry the disease for several years before showing symptoms, and many, especially bucks, are harvested before they reach the age where the disease becomes prevalent. Biologists in Nebraska believe that CWD will continue to spread across the state and will remain a threat to deer and elk populations for the foreseeable future. Nebraska stopped testing for the disease in 2012 when federal funding was lost. Commission biologists will resume testing during this year's firearm season, with plans to collect samples from hunter-harvested deer at check stations in northeastern Nebraska. In the years to come, testing will rotate between regions, allowing biologists to track changes in the distribution and prevalence rates of infection. Some states have taken other steps to stop the spread of CWD. These include bans on feeding and baiting deer, which artificially concentrates the animals and makes them more susceptible to infection, something that is also true with brainworm. Bans on the movement of captive wildlife, which is believed to have been a major factor in the spread of the disease, have been implemented by some states. In others, powerful lobbying efforts of game farm interests have rebuffed attempts to enact restrictions that could help slow the spread. Management Hunters have long been the best tool wildlife managers at the Commission have for controlling deer herds, which if left unchecked often outgrow their welcome with landowners by causing damage to crops and stack yards. But managing mule deer has been a complicated task in Nebraska. Populations vary greatly from one deer management unit to the next, and even within a unit, and the presence of both white-tailed deer and mule deer further complicates the issue. Mule deer could be considered easy to hunt by some. Whitetails sprint away from danger when disturbed, often never to be seen again. On the other hand, mule deer are known for their seemingly slower stotting gate, in which all four hooves push off the ground simultaneously, sending the deer bounding away in leaps that can easily take them over a fence and cover up to 15 feet. Often, mule deer will stop after covering 100 yards, give or take, and turn to get a better look at what they were running from. That makes them extremely susceptible to today's high-powered and even muzzleloading rifles. Hunters in 2014 harvested 9,200 mulies, with deer coming from all 18 of the state's deer management units. That was up from 2013, when 8,600 deer were taken, the first time since 1983 the total had dipped below 9,000, but down from the 2008 record of 11,787. Whitetail harvest surpassed that of mule deer in 1973 and in 2014 The free-roaming nature of mule deer and the vast landscape they live in requires that hunters, especially bowhunters like John Griess of Ogallala, pictured here on a hunt in Arthur County, resort to spot-and-stalk techniques to get within range.