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CWD Follow-Up
- Thread starter 356
- Start date
356
5 year old buck +
I do not know if it is published or not. The source was the University of Georgia, based on my notes.
Howboutthemdawgs
5 year old buck +
I hate being like this, but I discount the whole article when I see a claim like this.
deerassociation.com
“In 2020, I had nearly 30 bucks on trail-camera I estimated to be 3½ years old or older. In 2024, I felt confident we had only seven or eight deer in that age class. A stark decrease. I also ran about 20 more trail cameras on this 115-acre property”
CWD is Ravaging My Family’s Land, But It’s Not Too Late for You
Wisconsin hunter Paul Annear shares his personal story of how CWD has affected his deer hunting experiences and what can happen if hunters ignore CWD.
deerassociation.com
“In 2020, I had nearly 30 bucks on trail-camera I estimated to be 3½ years old or older. In 2024, I felt confident we had only seven or eight deer in that age class. A stark decrease. I also ran about 20 more trail cameras on this 115-acre property”
356
5 year old buck +
BenA, I have emailed the presenter to provide me with the source data. Once I have the answer, I will post it on this thread.
Bill
Administrator
I hate being like this, but I discount the whole article when I see a claim like this.
CWD is Ravaging My Family’s Land, But It’s Not Too Late for You
Wisconsin hunter Paul Annear shares his personal story of how CWD has affected his deer hunting experiences and what can happen if hunters ignore CWD.
“In 2020, I had nearly 30 bucks on trail-camera I estimated to be 3½ years old or older. In 2024, I felt confident we had only seven or eight deer in that age class. A stark decrease. I also ran about 20 more trail cameras on this 115-acre property”
View attachment 90184
Yeah that's quite the claim. On nearly 4X the land I have never recorded 30 mature bucks. Maybe he really sucks at guessing the age of a deer...
gunther89
5 year old buck +
I grew up hunting in Sauk County and would routinely go for drives over in Richland County to look at fields covered in deer. It wouldn't be out of the ordinary to see fields of over 100 deer in them including seeing a dozen or more bucks that looked huge. Now you are lucky to see a field with 20 deer in it.
Heck even on our 125 acre farm, we have noticed the number of 3.5+ yr old bucks declining. We have also shot 4 bucks that have tested positive and seen or found plenty of sick looking bucks and does.
It really makes me question why I spend all the money I do on food plots and tree planting to see the buck quality declining at the rate it is.
Heck even on our 125 acre farm, we have noticed the number of 3.5+ yr old bucks declining. We have also shot 4 bucks that have tested positive and seen or found plenty of sick looking bucks and does.
It really makes me question why I spend all the money I do on food plots and tree planting to see the buck quality declining at the rate it is.
I dont believe that is a realistic expectation for everywhere. WI maybe so - AR, probably not. In the AR CWD study, the deer density actually declined to 1 dpsm - that is an unhuntable population
356
5 year old buck +
I hate being like this, but I discount the whole article when I see a claim like this.
CWD is Ravaging My Family’s Land, But It’s Not Too Late for You
Wisconsin hunter Paul Annear shares his personal story of how CWD has affected his deer hunting experiences and what can happen if hunters ignore CWD.
“In 2020, I had nearly 30 bucks on trail-camera I estimated to be 3½ years old or older. In 2024, I felt confident we had only seven or eight deer in that age class. A stark decrease. I also ran about 20 more trail cameras on this 115-acre property”
Your point is well taken. Over the top claims and headlines hurt, not help.
Doug Duren, whose land has been featured on Meateater for this work introducing new hunters to the sport, has also experienced a similar decline and concern. I heard Doug speak at the CWD symposium this summer, and his first hand account was powerful. Here is a link to an interview from early 2025 on the Blood Origins Podcast. The conversation on CWD on his farm starts at about 6:30 into the podcast.
(not intending to be critical of any individual, just general observation)
Over the top claims is what built the internet. Nearly the entire internet is funded by commerce, and specifically much of the internet is funded on advertising. Without 'click bait' headlines, there is no internet.
But to your point, over the top claims are the enemy of sober topics of scientific research.
To be heard on the net, research must take on a self defeating over the top tone. That's a tough position.
Howboutthemdawgs
5 year old buck +
The problem I have i see something like that is i immediately invalidate the whole message. If you can be that off (im making an assumption here but im pretty sure im not wrong) about that major detail, how can I believe the rest. Judging from the pictures provided in the article there’s a whole bunch of “meh” bucks so I’m not confident in his land being the one ginormous outlier. Additionally, it makes me question NDA and their willingness to run with at least that part of the story. If I picked up in that in two seconds, surely in their infinite wisdom, they would have caught that as well.
Lastly, IF, and I should change that to 100 text size cause it’s such a longshot, he did have 30 mature bucks using his 115 acres, NDA, should use him to write the definitive book on how to have the single greatest small-ish property on planet earth.
Also…20 ADDITIONAL cams from years prior!!! 20 alone is one per 5.75 acres. So I’m assuming he’s running one cam every 2-3 acres or something like that. This article is cringy and laughable and the fact that the Cervid Program Supervisor for Missouri put enough stock in it to send it out and use it as a resource is a little odd to me.
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Bill
Administrator
It is a shame they used that article. I guess for hunters who are not as involved as many of us that might slip by. But it does stick out more than one of Bartyla's turds in the punch bowl if you have a clue.
Howboutthemdawgs
5 year old buck +
Yeah, I’m definitely not a CWD denier but I think the weight of decisions and regulations are so consequential that I would rather do nothing until the science can 100% come to an agreement then to run with information like this.
I agree. I saw the headline and didn't bother to read the article.
356
5 year old buck +
To all who questioned the deer density numbers in Arkansas, you were correct: I received this from the Task Force leader this morning:Yeah, that seems exceptionally high. I wonder where those numbers come from. I think you already know of this SwampCat, but here is the most recent paper from NW AR. This is in the Tier 1 area that was hardest hit.
White-tailed deer population declines in a high-prevalence chronic wasting disease region of Arkansas, USA - PMC
Chronic wasting disease (CWD) is a fatal transmissible spongiform encephalopathy affecting cervids worldwide. CWD was first detected in Arkansas in 2015 and as of August 2025 has been detected in 24 counties across the state. Within the Tier 1 CWD ...pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
I actually lived a few years in NW AR in the early 2000's. I never hunted the area but hiked a bunch of the parks and shed hunted some private properties. I remember commenting to my family that the deer numbers seemed much higher there than at our farm in NE MO at the time.
Regarding your question, during our meeting, we did not provide a deer density estimate in northwest Arkansas prior to when CWD was first discovered there because it has not been reported in a peer-reviewed publication. I can confidently say that it was not 147 deer per square mile, though, because deer densities in rural areas of the Midwest and Southeast are most often in the 25-35 deer per square mile range . . . the 147 deer per square mile statistic is not correct in terms of pre-CWD deer densities in northwest Arkansas.
So, the CWD decline is likely 25-30 deer PSM to 5 PSM in northwest Arkansas.
I am going to EDIT my OP to make a note of this correction.
I still can't get over the fact that one can go to any farm or sports store and see tons of mineral and feed etc for sale. In a county and all the counties around it that have a ban on their use. I don't even see warning signs/notices except on some of the packaging if you look hard enough.
Either take it seriously or don't.
Either take it seriously or don't.
Even in the NW AR study area, AR G&F still allowed baiting. Talk about kicking the deer while they are down.
