Lyssy and Eckels mixed it for me and my neighbors. Our recipe came from a doc in Oklahoma.

You should really google "horse fly mouth parts". It's a direct blood transfer when a horse fly bites a host animal and then bites a healthy animal.

Yeah I know they're not "recognized" as a specific vector, I'm just saying that I've seen two major outbreaks of anthrax and about 150 "perfect storm" wet/hot/dry spell cycles (think about it, in the hot zones ALL non winter wet spells are followed by a quick drying warm up).

During the two outbreaks, the horse flies numbers were incredible. In the 148 other wet/hot/dry cycles you couldn't hardly find a horse fly.

It might not be recognized by the scientific community. But I recognize it.

Unfortunately, most of the outbreaks of anthrax in places like Val Verde county are never reported and never become statistics. I learned this the hard way. Ranches/ranchers in the area will not talk about it, acknowledge it, or will give vague and misleading information.

One ranch hand who was feeling talkative educated me. He said they find dead animals all the time. Even when finding multiple animals that were clearly the victims of Anthrax, they simply burn them and are given strict orders not to talk or disclose it. That way, owners, ramrods, or lease managers can "honestly" say they don't know of any anthrax outbreaks - because until they are reported, researched and verified - "who knows what those animals died of - anybody's guess".

All over our 6000 acres this last week. No carcasses found. So far so good. We are on 674. Keeping our fingers crossed

Were there a lot of deer/horse/biting flies? By a lot I mean an abnormally high amount that you would notice.

I can assure you that when there is an "outbreak" it's not "concealable" by ranch hands/ranchers/outfitters trying to cover it up. It is very obvious when an area loses 80-90% of their animals. Word of mouth from hunters and today on social media has helped spread the news.

I think what he might have been referring to is normal anthrax annual mortality. Every year in the anthrax endemic zones there are deaths from anthrax. Not enough to significantly affect populations, but they occur nonetheless.

Hiding that is relatively easy but it really has no effect on hunting.

theRancher, listen to this and decide for yourself.

The place - Val Verde country, Brewer Ranch, 2009-2010, mid July. Group of hunters leasing the area and have been feeding, managing for a couple of year. They have a good crop of deer, high numbers (for the area), and have been tracking deer via game cams during the summer.

Over the course of just 1 week - all animals disappear from game cams. No animals seen, where they had been consistently getting pictures of dozens of deer for months. They question rancher/manager, no one knows anything. As the season progresses, no one hunting sees any animals all season.

After season, it leaks out that big anthrax hit on that ranch and neighboring property - 90% or more of all animals are wiped out. The lessors check into it and find that indeed there was an outbreak - but it was never reported to any authority.

The following year I am suckered into leasing. Go all year feeding, scouting, and running cams. Only 3-4 deer are ever seen. Ask about it (since I was shown pics of all these trophy deer from past couple of years). Rancher, ramrod, lease manager all tell me "just wait, they'll come out in a few months", "just wait, they'll come out of the woodwork when we get rain", "just wait, they'll come out the woodwork when it gets cool", and my favorite "We saw over a 100 deer driving in".

Nothing happens. Spend 30+ days on the property during season, only saw two live deer - and two merino sheep. (Did see plenty of hogs though). Even went so far as to spend several nights driving around on the roads, highways with a spotlight trying to find any deer. Never saw ANY. Even did a helicopter fly over - only saw 11 deer total over a LARGE area (thousands of acres). I should mention that once we got out of the effected area, we did see hundreds!

Started checking around myself. Finally got folks, neighbors and feed guys, to talk about the big kill that happened. Even had a ranch work take me to a pile of bones on a neighboring pasture where he and others burned animals.

Went back to rancher and lease manager and confronted them. They were vague and misleading in their comments. Saying things like "I don't KNOW of any anthrax outbreak", and "there are no official reports", etc. And there wasn't - go back and check online, you won't see any reports filed. Talked with Border Patrol one evening - he confirmed he saw folks collecting and burning carcasses - lots of carcasses. Game warden said he knew of it by word of mouth, it was "common" knowledge - but nothing official.

Think I'm making this up? The prior lessors of the property are folks right here on THF. Go back a couple of years and search reports - and the whole kill off is well documented. Hear it from someone besides me, and who has all the details. Then judge for yourself.

If there are no official reports filed - then it just didn't happen, right?

And just something to consider. Out that way, between Pandale and Juno, it is VERY remote and mostly badlands. There is no infrastruture for miles. Like you have to go more than 50 miles (as the crow flies) to get to a store, gas, water, etc. There is no incidental traffic. It is VERY easy to conceal just about anything that happens. Yes, word of mouth will leak out - eventually. But official reports - it just doesn't happen.

VERY familiar with that area and the remoteness. Owned over 7,000 acres out there just east of the Devils river starting in 1996. I sold out in 2006 after suffering through the 2001 outbreak.

It sounds like the Brewer ranch had a very localized outbreak and that it was severe.

A question, did you know the hunters, and did they tell you about what you described in the first part of the post? If so, it would seem word of mouth actually did overcome the efforts of the rancher/outfitter to hide the outbreak.

That outbreak was not successfully hidden though. Just googled it and came up with this. http://discussions.texasbowhunter.com/forums/showthread.php?t=390003

So, it was (or is now at least) common knowledge that the Brewer had anthrax in 2009.

"Official reporting" is not required if only wildlife are involved. The only "official" requirements are concerning livestock. Any ranchers in that area that don't vaccinate for anthrax deserve to lose their animals.

I definitely sympathize with you and anyone who loses their deer like that. I know exactly how painful it is.

When I bought my places out there, there was no requirement to note that "this ranch is located in an area that is known to have periodic anthrax problems". By the time I sold out, that disclaimer was showing up on all ranch contracts.

Hopefully hunters will see stuff like this thread and do some due diligence in those areas.

I leased a pasture on the Brewer in 2012. Hunted hard and saw 6 deer all season. I did kill two good bucks, but I got lucky. Anthrax is surely a problem there. We would see dozens of deer through Crocket County on the way there. When you hit the Val Verde line, it was like someone turned a switch off. Saw more illegals than deer at that point. I now have a lease in Crocket County. It's not immune from outbreaks, but I did a better job of looking into it, and they haven't had any issues recently.

I think he was implying that he traveled all around his six thousand acres and didn't any signs. At least, that's what I'm hoping.

I think so too. My point is, if he didn't see an abnormally high population of biting flies then not only is there no outbreak now, but there won't be one either.

The horseflies and biting flies were very few

Its not causd by ticks
http://www.tpwd.state.tx.us/landwater/land/habitats/faq/diseases/disease7.phtml

Anthrax bacteria reside in the soil in many regions of Texas, but epizootics are more frequent in the counties mentioned above. During the warm summer months, when there are rapid changes in climatic conditions (alternating periods of rain and drought), spores of the bacterium can be found at the soil surface and on low-level vegetation where they are readily available for ingestion by livestock/wildlife. The incubation period is between 1 and 10 days. After the onset of clinical signs, livestock/wildlife die very rapidly, in as little as 3-4 hours. Clinical signs include depression, lethargy, and staggering; animals may try to get to water. Live animals often are not found. The first indication of an outbreak on an individual property typically is when carcasses are located. Often, the carcass will appear to be from an otherwise healthy-looking animal (no signs of prolonged illness).

I hope our deer don't get depressed.

Think you need to re-read some of his posts on this thread. He never said anything about ticks.

Yep. I can see where he got confused since I just called the flies bloodsuckers in that post.

However, he also got confused and believed I said they "caused" anthrax. Which I never said nor implied.

Hopefully this scenario below will clarify what I believe:

In a normal year you have a few cases of anthrax (surely by now we all know those cases are "caused" by ingesting spores from a bloom). Once you have an infected host animal it's accepted fact that anthrax can be "transmitted" by sharing bodily fluids with an infected host animal.

What I believe is that biting flies (especially horse flies with their bladed mouthparts) can and do transmit the disease once a few animals are infected by the normal routes.

In 2000 or 2001 (the worst year I can remember) the horseflies were swarming the southwestern hill country in incredible numbers. The nature of flies is they bite one animal and then go to another. If there are enough flies to transmit lethal doses of the now blood born pathogen... Flies would explain the rapid spread of the disease in an "outbreak" (defined as an abnormally high anthrax mortality year) than any other vector IMO.

Key word is "vector"there galyon1 Vectors don't cause it, they just help spread it.

I have never had to deal with anthrax on a property I've been on but it has been my understanding that grazing animals inhale/ingest the spors and become infected.

It has also been explained to me that animals can pass it to each other thru saliva, like at a protein feeder

This was written about human transmission but it mostly applys
Cutaneous infection is by contact with tissues of animals (cattle, sheep, goats, horses, pigs and others) dying of the disease; possibly by biting flies that had partially fed on such animals; by contact with contaminated hair, wool, hides or products made from them, such as drums, brushes or rugs; or by contact with soil associated with infected animals or contaminated bone meal used in gardening. Inhalation anthrax results from inhalation of spores in risky industrial processes -- such as tanning hides and processing wool or bone -- where aerosols of B. anthracis spores may be produced. Intestinal and oropharyngeal anthrax arise from ingestion of contaminated undercooked meat; there is no evidence that milk from infected animals transmits anthrax. The disease spreads among grazing animals through contaminated soil and feed; among omnivorous and carnivorous animals through contaminated meat, bone meal or other feeds; and among wildlife from feeding on carcasses infected with anthrax. Accidental infections may occur among laboratory workers.

I don't disagree with any of that. Except when people decide that the ONLY way grazing animals can get it is by grazing.

I'm telling you all from experience that the worst anthrax I've ever seen was when there were swarms of horseflies everywhere.

And while it says it's "possible" above for humans to contract it from biting flies... if you think about the mechanics for just a second you can understand that once a few animals get it (which is normal EVERY year in anthrax prone zones), if they get bit by TONS of flies (years when flies are epidemic), it greatly magnifies the risk of infection to animals.

Humans don't just stand there and let flies bite them. But animals can't slap them or get away from them. If you've ever watched a horse fly go after an animal you know that if you don't have arms or a LONG tail your pretty much gonna get bit tons of times.

Here's some more mechanics. What do you think is more efficient spreading it far and wide to most animals? Flies, or grazing on a few localized areas where a bloom of spores is occurring??

Yep. It's pretty plain to you if you live through it once or twice.

Again, there is no abnormal population explosion of biting flies this year. There will be no outbreaks. Just a few cases spread out over a large area.

And since it's a blood born pathogen... sharing blood is probably even more effective than saliva.

Here's a pic of the blades in a horse fly's mouth. They don't just suck blood through a tube. They slice and dice your skin and then just lap up the blood out of the pool that forms.

According to one site I looked at 30 horse flies can drain about half a pint of blood in 6 hours.

https://www.google.com/search?q=horse+fly+mouthparts&rlz=1C1GGGE_enUS430&espv=2&tbm=isch&imgil=ZfmlGQBcChDLrM%253A%253Bhttps%253A%252F%252Fencrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com%252Fimages%253Fq%253Dtbn%253AANd9GcQwBaCEYbMuiN9xLQAwEo5EtQJtoWNV8GCWPyowX9rVyDS7aMK0%253B200%253B150%253B7jmKtavGxRELWM%253Bhttp%25253A%25252F%25252Fwww.asktheexterminator.com%25252Fflies%25252FHorse_Fly.shtml&source=iu&usg=__Aa-QFGzY7HT-79mwIw1kuChmcTU%3D&sa=X&ei=cPLBU96FM-q-8QGH7ICgBQ&ved=0CCcQ9QEwBA&biw=1024&bih=634#facrc=_&imgdii=_&imgrc=u2OyKDwozIr46M%253A%3Bqxbq8Y3cso1_tM%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fagsci.psu.edu%252Felearning%252Fcourse-samples%252Fent_202%252FLn_1%252Fimages%252F1-mouth9.jpg%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fagsci.psu.edu%252Felearning%252Fcourse-samples%252Fent_202%252FLn_1%252FL1_7.htm%3B333%3B250

Just out at my place S.W. of Rocksprings on 674 last week. Not much for bugs of any sorts in the hills around my cabin. A few mosquitos, occasional "robber fly", not one deer fly or tick. And I was out in the bush working & sweaty, so would have noticed. In Canada & parts of the Midwest there is a nasty spore inhaled killer called Blastomychosis. A killer to even humans. I've had 2 dogs infected - not fun.

Ive had 10 anthrax shots from my days in the Marine Corps. Not too worried about coming across it. If anyone is good, should be me

Don't worry... this wasn't a bad biting fly year. And guess what.. There was no outbreak... Imagine that..