So if all the deer are raised on the farm and no new deer have been brought in how did CWD get there?

Deer outside the fence?

Good question. Maybe TPW is missing an opportunity to use this place as a case study and find out.

If my understanding of the law is correct, it is not legal to have a game animal as a pet. But we can have them as a business? I think that CWD or not, this captive breeding/selling of whitetail deer is a perversion where money, politics, and the TPWD, created a mess that benefits very few. As a hunter of wild game, it would be fine with me to do away with this part of "hunting."

I have no issue with game being trapped by TPWD, then moved. No issue with the exotics. The point I made was the industry that breeds/raises/sells whitetail deer. They are a game animal, and this is a niche market that does not benefit the average hunter. As far as more deer in N TX, I don't think that is because of captive deer breeding.

I am guessing many think of canned hunts when they think of Deer Breeding Facilities. That's selling that microcosm of the hunting industry way short.

In the mid-nineties, a fella obtained 2,000 acres of prime Freer low brush and low fenced ranch land. The front property boundary was a county road. Along some of the the back of the property was a HF. On one side there were smaller places and on the other side, even smaller places. Along those two sides, the number of blinds sitting on the fence line was, well, intimidating. Many if not most of the small property owners wanted their blinds on the large neighbor's low fence.

Hunting the place, they just did not see any substantial deer numbers and thought there may have been a die off. What they found out was there was a perpetual die off. At the end of the second season, they hired a helo survey and observed 11 deer. Yep, one deer to every 180 acres. Aerially visualizing the surrounding properties detailed a hunting activity congestion which was not healthy. The costly decision was made to HF the place. Upon completion, they brought in fifty bred does and began a supplemental feed program. The bred does were delivered in early 98, just prior to the one of the worst droughts in memory. Those which survived were strong. The next year, they brought in four tagged bucks and set them loose.

Five years into it and for whatever reason, the blinds along the fence lines fell into disrepair. The deer herd within the HF enclosure now protected from the neighbors, healthily swelled. At this time, the ranch now produces an amazing abundance of healthy animals and some absolute, bomber trophy studs. I do not know what would have happened without the introduction of the 54 animals brought from a deer breeder, but I do know what happened since they were introduced. If in the very same situation, I would have done no different.

You don't think maybe they would have gotten the same results with the supplemental feeding and the deer they had?

But the line between politics and science has been moved. If the man has a high fence herd they need the new data more than they need to kill those deer.

The two most important factors in CWD are the ones I have not seen any data for- how contagious is it and what really causes the prions to mutate? We all have prions these are mutated prions.

What if it is caused by pollution? Or Roundup/Parquat? Or something else entirely?

We know CWD is nothing like EHD. EHD can wipe out half or 3/4 of a herd in a season. We’re not freaking out about that.

Even if CWD is 100% fatal, fatal when? Not that long ago most deer didn’t live long enough to suffer the symptoms of CWD.

The politically correct reaction to CWD is to overreact. If there is one thing I have learned in this life, it’s the status quo is almost never the right way of handling things. We need to handle this differently. Slaughter the herd and scorch the earth is not the answer.