Sask. deer kill aids CWD check

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Published: June 13, 2002

Hunters will have more opportunities to kill deer this fall, as

Saskatchewan Environment steps up its campaign to eradicate chronic

wasting disease.

Kevin Omoth, the department’s CWD manager, said 40,000 white-tailed

deer are normally taken each year in Saskatchewan. Seven hundred

permits are also issued for mule deer, but this year, another several

hundred collection permits will also be issued.

These permits are free, but require hunters to turn in the animals’

heads for CWD testing by Saskatchewan Environment.

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“We’re trying to be pretty aggressive to see if it exists there,” Omoth

said.

CWD is a fatal brain disease similar to scrapie in sheep, bovine

spongiform encephalopathy in cattle and new variant Creutzfeldt-Jacob

disease in humans.

Since last fall, Omoth said 4,000 wild deer samples tested negative for

CWD. The three confirmed cases all came from the Manito Sand Hills

region near Lloydminster.

Saskatchewan Environment shot 185 deer in the area in April, including

a mule deer, now confirmed as the most recent case of CWD. Meat from

most of these culled animals was salvaged and distributed to food banks

and Indian communities, Omoth said.

He said high priority areas for the provincial eradication program

include Hillmond, Paradise Hill and Mudie Lake near Pierceland, where

three game farms have been identified by the federal inspection agency

as highly contaminated.

As CWD is considered a disease that occurs in and slowly spreads

throughout a local area, Omoth is not concerned about CWD in the

general provincial deer herd.

“While we’d like to never get another positive in Saskatchewan, it

wasn’t a huge surprise to find another positive in that small area.”

Omoth expects the testing and surveillance will continue, because an

area or farm is considered CWD-free only when no cases surface during a

five-year period.

About the author

Karen Morrison

Saskatoon newsroom

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