I'm looking to buy some deer in the next weeks or so to start a deer farm. I've been hearing a lot about cwd, tb, and burc but can't find much info on them. Was wondering how I could become certified or tested in each of those, and if I buy my deer from a farmer already certified and tested am I certified if so do I need paper work to prove it. And how would I maintain my certification threw out the years? Just curious bout these thongs that i didnt get to ask when i visited some of the local other deer farms.
As long as you by from a certified farm your farm will get the same status. Just be sure if you by from more than one farm you check their status cause you will go under the lowest status . As long as they are 5 year cwd or more you are good to go. After five years you are a certified herd and anything beyond that does not matter. You will have to tb test every three years no matter what even after you are tb certified.
Is TB and burc the same thing?? And how do you test the deer for TB? And is it right you only test for CWD when one dies?
Joined Apr 2009
624 Posts | 0+
*******, PA
No they are two different things. They each require a separate test. Burc is just tested by drawing blood and the lab tests it. The TB is more involved. You must dart or run them through a chute. You shave a patch of hair on their neck so the vet can make an injection. 72 hrs later the vet comes back out, you dart or run the deer back through the chute. The vet feels the injection area. If it is lumped up at all then they are "suspect". If no lump that deer is done. The deer that are suspect need to be ran back through the whole process again this time the vet checks for only bovine TB. Most of the time the animal that is suspect is due to having a form of avian TB. For the bovine test it is exactly the same except at the time of injection the state vet (they are required to do the retest) takes a caliper reading of the test site. After the same 72 hr wait the state vet comes back out and calipers the test site again. If the reading falls between a certain range the animal is ok and you are done. If it test in a certain high range the state will then buy your animal off of you and run a full necropsy on that animal. My state vet said she has only ever had to necropsy one deer ever and it didnt even have bovine TB. It other problems that made the deer experince the same simptom. You are correct, CWD is only tested for at the time of death. Because the only way to test is by using a piece of the brain stem.
Hope this helps out and I hope I was clear enough for you.
Hope this helps out and I hope I was clear enough for you.
If I buy them from a farm that is already CWD and TB tested then how to I go about getting the correct paperwork to show that I have a status and am certified?
And if one dies, where do I send it to for CWD testing?
How often do you test for TB and burc?
And if one dies, where do I send it to for CWD testing?
How often do you test for TB and burc?
You will have to get ahold of you state department that takes care of this stuff or else get a hold of a nother farmer in your state so they can direct you in the right direction. In PA we have to tb test every3 years.