DNR Confirms CWD Detected in Fond Du Lac County

Baiting and feeding ban renewed in Fond Du Lac and Winnebago counties

The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) confirmed that a wild deer tested positive for chronic wasting disease (CWD) in the Town of Eldorado, which is located in the north-central section of neighboring Fond du Lac County. The discovery was made within 10 miles of the Winnebago County border and roughly 13 miles from the Dodge County border. As required by state law, the DNR will renew the baiting and feeding bans in Fond du Lac and Winnebago counties. Dodge County is one of 57 Wiscosnin counties that does not allow baiting and feeding.

See CWD page 9

A whitetail doe off County Highway 28 outside of Theresa. file photo CWD

from page 1 A local landowner reported the deer, an adult doe, to the department in early October. The deer showed outward signs of disease and possible injury by car collision.

This is the first wild deer detection in Fond du Lac County.

In Dodge County, of the 2,613 analyzed samples since CWD testing began more than one decade ago, only five positive cases of the disease have ever been recorded.

To help slow the spread of CWD, the DNR enacts baiting and feeding bans in counties where deer have tested positive for CWD as required by state law. Bait piles can encourage deer to congregate unnaturally around a shared food source where sick deer can spread CWD through direct contact with healthy deer or by leaving behind infectious prions in their saliva and urine.

Baiting and feeding were already banned in Fond du Lac County and Winnebago counties due to CWD detections in adjoining counties within 10 miles of the county line. This most recent detection will extend the ban for three years in Fond du Lac County and for two years in Winnebago County.

The DNR asks deer hunters within Fond du Lac and Winnebago counties to assist with efforts to identify where CWD occurs. Those harvesting deer within 10 miles of the most recent positive are especially encouraged to have their harvested adult deer tested for CWD. Collecting CWD samples is essential for assessing where and to what extent CWD occurs in deer across the state.

As ever, successful CWD management depends, in part, on citizen involvement in the decision- making process through local County Deer Advisory Councils (CDAC). The DNR and the Fond du Lac CDAC will hold a public meeting on the status of CWD and a response plan for sampling wild deer in Fond du Lac County. The meeting will take place Tuesday, Nov. 16, at 6 p.m., at the Radisson Hotel and Conference Center (Meeting Room B) located at 625 W Rolling Meadows Drive in the City of Fond du Lac.

CWD is a fatal, infectious nervous system disease of deer, moose, elk and reindeer/caribou. It belongs to the family of diseases known as transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs) or prion diseases. CWD occurs only in members of the Cervidae or deer family - both wild and captive. The Wisconsin DNR began monitoring the state’s wild white-tailed deer population for CWD in 1999. The first positives were found in 2002.

Information on how to have deer tested during the 2020-21 hunting seasons is available at dnr.wisconsin. gov/topic/WildlifeHabitat/registersample. html.