CWD found in 2 more Upper Green River elk

[Lasiocarpa]

I have seen the massive herds on the east side of the state and I agree that they are not comparable to elk on feed grounds out here.

Large natural herds moving through the landscape together does not compare to concentrating them on the same 100 acres, all winter, year after year.

 

[wytex]

So you all are surprised that cwd made it over?
What do you think would happen when it is found all over the state?
What should G&F do about it?
Maybe close the feedgrounds?

Elk have been artificially concentrated on feedgrounds for years, disease is inevitable when animals are treated that way.
You all are so upset what is your plan of action?

Yes some will succumb to cwd but your herds will be ok. Where has it decimated an elk herd?

 

[BuzzH]

The key point you have made is they "move all around". See the difference? 600 elk will spend the entire winter on that one location in the picture. Licking every drop of the alfalfa they are fed from a puddle of their own excrement.
It will all be ok though. Despite warnings from every expert in the field of wildlife disease epidemiology, we have expert sportsmen and women telling us it will all turn out just fine.

I listened to a top cwd expert about 10-12 years ago give a presentation on how the elk in the Laramie range were at a tipping point with cwd prevalence. That included elk becoming extinct in that range, pretty scary stuff. All sorts of modeling, flashy slides, the usual photos of a couple cwd positive elk, etc. etc.

Flash forward to a couple years ago and the GF is issuing kill permits, hunting from August-March, wardens killing 40 elk at a wack, and most interestingly the GF hired a couple guys to shoot 160 elk...all to keep that in herd in check.

This in the area in the state with the highest prevalence of cwd in elk in all of Wyoming.

Oh, almost forgot, those 160 elk that we paid 2 guys to kill, all tested for cwd, 1 was positive.

The GF can not get these elk under control and were thinking of aerial gunning to control them. For a herd at the tipping point with cwd a dozen or more years ago, I'm just not sure when we're going to see the doom and gloom in that presentation? I hope we never do, but I think a bit more honesty and trying to keep the horse in front of the cart before making outlandish predictions/claims would help.

 

[appaloosa]

So you all are surprised that cwd made it over?
What do you think would happen when it is found all over the state?
What should G&F do about it?
Maybe close the feedgrounds?

Elk have been artificially concentrated on feedgrounds for years, disease is inevitable when animals are treated that way.
You all are so upset what is your plan of action?

Yes some will succumb to cwd but your herds will be ok. Where has it decimated an elk herd?

Yep, let's just keep feeding them and see what happens. It will all be ok

Let's just promise to revise this thread in 5 years. It's bookmarked and on my calendar.

If you are curious about what CWD is capable of read up on the elk herd at Windcave National Park.

 

[WIbiggame]

I hope we never do, but I think a bit more honesty and trying to keep the horse in front of the cart before making outlandish predictions/claims would help

This is where WI dropped the ball initially with hunters. Tried killing all the deer, earn a buck, paid a couple million for Dr Deer to come in. Lost a lot of trust with people. That 20 years later they are trying to get back. All while CWD is still here.

Edit: I would think tho that comparing feed ground elk to elk that move around to find food is like comparing apples and oranges tho. 1 strategy might work 1 place and not another.

 

[brocksw]

I think it’s a safe bet to assume that if feed grounds continue, they will likely play host to some of the highest CWD prevalences in elk, in the world. Purely because of the nature of how they work and the mechanics of disease transmission.

Now what that means? I don’t know. To my knowledge, there’s never been an elk herd that really reaches high prevalence like happens in deer. Does that mean these elk herds will top out at 20%? 30-40%? or will they reach 70%+? I don’t think anyone knows the answer to that in elk. We already know it happens in deer, as has been demonstrated in multiple regions. Again, If feed grounds continue and nothing is done, I think it’s likely this will be where it happens.

I would agree with Appaloosa’s point about this feed ground stuff being an experiment that has never been run before.

But I think it’s also important to mention that elk seem to handle CWD better. Both from the standpoint of the individual animal and from a population level. CWD can hit deer herds a lot harder.

Wind cave elk CWD prevalence has reached as high as 29%. But they have underwent multiple efforts to reduce populations by up to half. Those efforts, at least to my understanding, have resulted in lowering prevalence fairly significantly each time. But then it starts building right back up within those populations. IIRC, there been 3 population reduction efforts since about 2016 (I could be a little off there).

To me, the only solution to this is something similar to the following (again just my opinion):

- Reduce feed grounds elk populations by 25-40% (popular I’m sure)
- Start reducing the length of time the feeding grounds are used with the intention of phasing them out asap.
- Buy or lease land on those winter ranges to start developing natural winter range to help spread those elk out so they can feed on natural forage.(even harder than it sounds)

Part of the problem here is the complexities of the problem itself. While on the surface this discussion seems similar to the baiting discussion that takes place here in ND. In my opinion, this is a far more complex issue. Partly due to landscape topography, partly due to the nature of wintering behavior of elk vs deer, and partly because of the alternatives available.

Brucellosis is a part of this conversation, where in deer it is not. That is an extremely challenging variable when working towards solutions on this issue specifically. Especially for cattle producers.

Buying/leasing land isn’t cheap and in my opinion it would really be necessary to implement a solution like I describe.

My personal thoughts are that we need to get away from artificially propping up these populations through emergency feeding programs. It’s going to bite us in the ass when it comes to disease. But I understand that’s going to take a lot of time, money, and effort.

I also think the false dichotomies are far too popular when it comes to these discussions. This idea that since we can’t completely solve an issue, we shouldn’t do anything at all. Whether it’s baiting deer or feeding elk, that argument seems to come from folks that are in support of short term gain or the status quo, over smart, long term decisions. I also think it’s a bad look for hunters to be promoting or using practices that are without a doubt, infecting critters with a 100% fatal neurological disease. Continuing to utilize feed grounds, in my opinion, is not in the best interest of the resource, even outside of the CWD topic.

But I don’t say any of this trying to chastise anyone. These feed ground discussions are far more complex than the baiting one being had here in ND. And the solutions are far more difficult to implement.

Just my 2 pennies

 

[BuzzH]

This is where WI dropped the ball initially with hunters. Tried killing all the deer, earn a buck, paid a couple million for Dr Deer to come in. Lost a lot of trust with people. That 20 years later they are trying to get back. All while CWD is still here.

Edit: I would think tho that comparing feed ground elk to elk that move around to find food is like comparing apples and oranges tho. 1 strategy might work 1 place and not another.

I think you need to see the size of the elk herds around here in SE Wyoming and how they use the landscape before you claim an apples to oranges comparison.

The elk in SE Wyoming can't disperse into as much country during the year like they do in other places.

 

[thebestusernamesaretaken]

I don't know why we can't figure this problem out. Can't we do that? Are we really working together to solve the problem?

 

[brocksw]

I think you need to see the size of the elk herds around here in SE Wyoming and how they use the landscape before you claim an apples to oranges comparison.

The elk in SE Wyoming can't disperse into as much country during the year like they do in other places.

I’m not personally familiar with that specific area, but I’m sure you’re raising a valid point.

But I think WIbiggame’s perspective holds some water as well. The reason I say that is because of the work that’s been done around infectivity.

Through inoculation, transmission, and dosage research the current understanding pretty clearly points to two things. Large, almost unnatural doses and prolonged and/or repeated exposure to the infectious agent is what’s necessary to infect animals.

If this disease was spread as easily as the common cold or flu, I would agree that feed grounds (and baiting bans) mean nothing. However, the infectivity research says otherwise.

The study below was led by Ed Hoover and performed on deer. While the dosage/exposure levels required are probably greater with elk, I think it’s probably safe to assume that the same concept of infectivity applies to elk, just at a different scale.

Very low oral exposure to prions of brain or saliva origin can transmit chronic wasting disease

The minimum infectious dose required to induce CWD infection in cervids remains unknown, as does whether peripherally shed prions and/or multiple low dose exposures are important factors in CWD transmission. With the goal of better understand CWD infection in nature, we studied oral exposures of...

journals.plos.org

In that study, they were able to infect deer with around a shot glass of infected saliva from an end-stage deer. So, the most infected saliva they could obtain. Remember prions don’t go dormant, they just slowly template themselves, so internal infectivity never stops. The further into disease you get, the more prions you are accumulating and therefore excreting.

But what’s important to note, is that dose had to be given all at once or in a very short window of time. When they broke that same dose size up into 10 doses over several weeks they couldn’t infect animals. I think they’ve observed animals up to something like 38-40 months to see if that smaller dose over several weeks just took longer. But they found no positives.

However, there’s been multiple other studies done in elk and deer where they don’t artificially inoculate them at all and instead put them in with other infected animals and/or make them eat out of infected troughs and live in the same holding pens where infected animals spent time. In those instances it takes several months to a year of that repeated exposure to infect the animals.

This is relevant because in these situations when we talk about feed grounds (or baiting), we know it is unlikely cervids are swapping shot glasses of spit directly into each others mouths on a regular basis. But we can surmise that the longer the direct exposure time, the more chance we have of infecting animals. And the more animals become infected and continue to use that exact same piece of ground, eat, pissing, and shitting on it while infected, the higher the dosage level accumulates and builds up in that spot over time. After a few years of infected animals contaminating that spot, it’s reasonable and logical to assume that now it won’t require as much time and exposure to infect animals from that location. Because the dosage size in the environment and that area has been building. Throw in the fact that some soil type increase infectivity and you have all the ingredients coming together.

This is one of the reasons many folks believe that baiting and supplemental feeding practices might be some of most suspect practices that not only spread the disease, but establishes hot spots and leads to decades long environmental contamination and transmission in that exact spot.

It’s the perfect recipe for transmission of this disease based on how infectivity works.

So, for normal winter herding in deer, maybe an average of 3 months (sometimes more, sometimes less), that’s certainly a risk. There will certainly be some transmission occurring, no doubt. But when hunters are out with bait piles all fall, you just increased that exposure rate by more than double if they started placing feed in August. When feed grounds are used, that is concentrating animals to eat and lick on the same exact chunk of ground day after day, month after month, year after year.

Again, I don’t want to claim to know all the details about the area Buzz is referencing. And like I said, he may have a valid point. But I would guess, given the infectivity research I’ve just shared, it’s still not quite to the level of risk that the feed grounds are.

 

[BuzzH]

I’m not personally familiar with that specific area, but I’m sure you’re raising a valid point.

But I think WIbiggame’s perspective holds some water as well. The reason I say that is because of the work that’s been done around infectivity.

Through inoculation, transmission, and dosage research the current understanding pretty clearly points to two things. Large, almost unnatural doses and prolonged and/or repeated exposure to the infectious agent is what’s necessary to infect animals.

If this disease was spread as easily as the common cold or flu, I would agree that feed grounds (and baiting bans) mean nothing. However, the infectivity research says otherwise.

The study below was led by Ed Hoover and performed on deer. While the dosage/exposure levels required are probably greater with elk, I think it’s probably safe to assume that the same concept of infectivity applies to elk, just at a different scale.

Very low oral exposure to prions of brain or saliva origin can transmit chronic wasting disease

The minimum infectious dose required to induce CWD infection in cervids remains unknown, as does whether peripherally shed prions and/or multiple low dose exposures are important factors in CWD transmission. With the goal of better understand CWD infection in nature, we studied oral exposures of...

journals.plos.org

View attachment 361698

In that study, they were able to infect deer with around a shot glass of infected saliva from an end-stage deer. So, the most infected saliva they could obtain. Remember prions don’t go dormant, they just slowly template themselves, so internal infectivity never stops. The further into disease you get, the more prions you are accumulating and therefore excreting.

But what’s important to note, is that dose had to be given all at once or in a very short window of time. When they broke that same dose size up into 10 doses over several weeks they couldn’t infect animals. I think they’ve observed animals up to something like 38-40 months to see if that smaller dose over several weeks just took longer. But they found no positives.

However, there’s been multiple other studies done in elk and deer where they don’t artificially inoculate them at all and instead put them in with other infected animals and/or make them eat out of infected troughs and live in the same holding pens where infected animals spent time. In those instances it takes several months to a year of that repeated exposure to infect the animals.
View attachment 361697
This is relevant because in these situations when we talk about feed grounds (or baiting), we know it is unlikely cervids are swapping shot glasses of spit directly into each others mouths on a regular basis. But we can surmise that the longer the direct exposure time, the more chance we have of infecting animals. And the more animals become infected and continue to use that exact same piece of ground, eat, pissing, and shitting on it while infected, the higher the dosage level accumulates and builds up in that spot over time. After a few years of infected animals contaminating that spot, it’s reasonable and logical to assume that now it won’t require as much time and exposure to infect animals from that location. Because the dosage size in the environment and that area has been building. Throw in the fact that some soil type increase infectivity and you have all the ingredients coming together.

This is one of the reasons many folks believe that baiting and supplemental feeding practices might be some of most suspect practices that not only spread the disease, but establishes hot spots and leads to decades long environmental contamination and transmission in that exact spot.

It’s the perfect recipe for transmission of this disease based on how infectivity works.

So, for normal winter herding in deer, maybe an average of 3 months (sometimes more, sometimes less), that’s certainly a risk. There will certainly be some transmission occurring, no doubt. But when hunters are out with bait piles all fall, you just increased that exposure rate by more than double if they started placing feed in August. When feed grounds are used, that is concentrating animals to eat and lick on the same exact chunk of ground day after day, month after month, year after year.

Again, I don’t want to claim to know all the details about the area Buzz is referencing. And like I said, he may have a valid point. But I would guess, given the infectivity research I’ve just shared, it’s still not quite to the level of risk that the feed grounds are.

Good info.

What I don't understand is that if exposure is linked to how much time animals spend with each other, then elk should have significantly higher prevalence than deer. Elk are a strong herd animal and spend a vast majority of the year in herds. Totally opposite with deer, line animals, small family groups a vast majority of the year.

Yet, that is preciously 180 degrees different, deer have much higher prevalence.

Also why I'm not going to light my hair on fire that a couple elk on a feed ground have cwd. I think it's pretty clear at this point elk are wayyy less susceptible to cwd than deer.

For the record, cwd aside, I've never been a fan of the feed grounds, baiting, etc.

I also think it's worth plucking the low hanging fruit to stop baiting and disperse elk away from feed grounds, whether or not that slows cwd.

 

[brocksw]

Good info.

What I don't understand is that if exposure is linked to how much time animals spend with each other, then elk should have significantly higher prevalence than deer. Elk are a strong herd animal and spend a vast majority of the year in herds. Totally opposite with deer, line animals, small family groups a vast majority of the year.

Yet, that is preciously 180 degrees different, deer have much higher prevalence.

Also why I'm going to light my hair on fire that a couple elk on a feed ground have cwd.

For the record, cwd aside, I've never been a fan of the feed grounds, baiting, etc.

I also think it's worth plucking the low hanging fruit to stop baiting and disperse elk away from feed grounds, whether or not that slows cwd.

That’s a fair question. There’s actually been some research looking into this with deer. These spatio-temporal analysis use GPS collars, trail cameras, and manual observations(some through video recordings), etc. Saskatchewan did some, Michigan has a study coming out relatively soon, and Mississippi did as well.

All those efforts show the same thing in deer. Artificial food sources represent the #1 aggregate of deer coming into contact with a single focal point. When they observe them bedding, mating, even in pre rut and rut behavior, no other thing on their landscape can bring them into direct or in direct contact with other animals like an artificial food source. And it really isn’t even close.

Now from the data I shared in the previous post, just being around each other isn’t necessarily the high risk. Not to say that there isn’t some association with being grouped like that. I think there is no question that there is. But in general, on a spectrum of infectivity, it probably doesn’t check all the boxes that a feed ground or bait pile does. In other words it’s not as suspect for that high frequency of direct or indirect contact.

This kind of goes back to the idea of CWD transmission mechanics not working like a virus that spreads like the cold, where a sneeze or a single lick could transmit disease. Those common viruses are incredibly communicable. They can spread by brief exposure to air born virus particles. CWD isn’t like that.

I’ll probably articulate this poorly but I’ll give it a shot.

You might have 500 elk in the same little field. Most of us have seen something like that. I watched a smaller herd of elk do this last fall, here in ND. They’re kind of spread out. A clump of elk here, a clump of elk there. Some mosey around and get up and cross a fence to feed. Some are bedded down. But none of them are really contacting the same spot of ground and ingesting material from it. In a natural site location, they certainly aren’t eating there everyday. They can’t. There’s only so much food there before it’s gone and they have to move on to somewhere else. We commonly see elk hang out in a spot and then a couple weeks later they moved over to another field or shifted a half mile over the hill.

Another example, you might have is a big herd of elk(like a picture that was shown in this thread), moving around the landscape. A big ball of elk so to speak. But how much are they all actually ingesting material from the same exact location? Yes they’re together, and there are likely some behaviors that do transmit disease or deposit infectious material. But not quite like eating off the same exact plate every single day.

Now, combine those examples with the concept of accumulating contamination in their environment. Even if they’re lounging around together or moving together, the deposition of infectious material through Saliva, urine, feces, etc., is just diluted based on the fact that they’re still somewhat mobile and no one is coming back to replenish their feed on the exact same spot it was for the previous month straight. So there isn’t really a chance for the contamination to build in a single focal point. It’s much more spread out, meaning lower levels in the environment and therefore lower exposure levels and lower dosage levels.

Now, there’s always exceptions. Situations where a certain place holds a lot of elk and even if they aren’t eating on the same exact spot, they’re still in the same location enough to start contaminating that environment. But overall, given the scenarios I describe, I’m putting my money on artificial sites being the most high risk and the most likely to be heavily contaminated, and the most likely source of infection.