Ehd vaccinate or not

Some will say yes and some will say no. I know farms who did and lost bout everything, so take it for whats it worth.

I had vaccinated my herd in the past but had none available to me the last 2 years. So I did not and lost 8 adult deer.

Farms 8 miles north of me had vaccinated with Mo.and Texas EHD vaccines.the Texas " miracle" shot and fence mounted misting systems and lost 100+ animals!

So it's anyone's guess what to do.............besides PRAY you never have it!

8 years ago I had 11 deer farms 8 miles from me.........after this past summer I only have 3 still in business!



Best of luck to you what ever you decide

Every deer I lost was vacinated. I vacinated the third time in Sept, 2 day's later everything I had was sick and most are no longer here. If I do give them the shot any more it will be early then give the booster all well before ehd time. I will never give them another shot late in the year, I think that shot just pushed them over the edge. The only farm in my area that did not lose a deer did not give any vacination at all. To be honest I doubt that I will give a vacination any more unless something new and much improved comes along. I will work more on killing the bug to prevent the problem.

I personally dont know if its worth vaccinating for EHD. Like stated previously I know cases where it helped as well as hindered. I believe their are around 25 different strains of EHD, and vaccines are only for either type 1 or type 2 just seems expensive for long odds.

We didnt do anything and we didnt loose a single deer we have farms all around us with misting systems and vaccinating that lost most if not all their deer take it for what it is But seems to be alot of money for systems and vaccines that dont seem to have very good Odds

I talked to Charles Black in La, and I believe he is on the right track. Hopefully with the studies LSU is doing they will come up with a vaccine that works on all strains. Charles seemed to think that after having dex compounded into 24mg per 1 cc and darting the deer that seemed invected with 2cc he said the deer was back at the feeder and fine within 24hrs. This seems like way to much to give at a time, but when your fighting a losing battle with this, I will try anything. But you will always have the ones that are fine in the morning and dead at noon.

We don't vaccinated or have a misting system. We treat as deer that show symptoms and have had good success. I need to have resistant deer for my hunting preserve. I can't give booster shots or mist effectively in my preserve.

In Oklahoma we are currently testing a vaccine two different kinds one is a liquid and one is a 2 pellet system with one dissolving instantly and the secondone in 2 weeks.Thus only having to handle 1 time.We are drawing blood and testing tighter levels.Blood was taken before the vaccine and 2 weeks later and we will conduct another draw this weekend.I will make the results available no matter what the results are.Wheather you believe in the vaccine or not we must conduct these studies to move forward.If it doesnt work we will learn from it as we move forward.

Cool info Skip, I hope it works! keep us posted it would be sweet to have a pelleted form to use.

Our farm is also involved in the testing that Skip is participating in. Newport Labs (Dr. Wagner and crew) were here yesterday drawing blood and will do so 2 more times on 10 doe fawns....5 which received the vaccine and 5 as a control group. This is a crucial study for EHD. Skip is in an area where EHD is prevalent and our farm is not so the blood samples could really help out on the disease for everyone. Lets hope that we find a break through for this horrible disease!

How has the disease effected everyone's fawns! The years I have had it I have never lost a fawn from it. I am sure they can get it but seems like all the people I have talked to the fawns don't get it as easy.??

It is comforting to know that there is at least some research being done on EHD.......where is the funding coming for this?

kurthumphrey said:

How has the disease effected everyone's fawns ! The years I have had it I have never lost a fawn from it. I am sure they can get it but seems like all the people I have talked to the fawns don't get it as easy.??

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I know of guys that lost every fawn they had last year.

We lost a bunch of fawns to EHD. However the majority of what we lost were deer 2 years old an older. About 60% of our mature does died.

Just wanted to update everyone we did another blood draw this weekend on all the deer involved in the vaccine research.10 deer that had been given the liquid vaccine and 10 deer that had been given the pellet vaccine and 2 controls 22 in all.I been told by some that it will not work but I guess we will have to see.This study is not pharmacutical controled ,but Industry driven so the results will not be mulled over but will be actual, with no agenda other than the health of our animals.I will report the findings as they become available.

From first hand knowledge I will tell you that all deer get EHD from 5yr old bucks to new born fawns. This year we lost 11 bucks from 1 to 5 years of age. We did have 3 bucks that had no symptoms, and they were 1, 2 and a 3 yr old. They were the first to die. We then had it move in to our adult does. We lost 29 adult does. But we also had 19 survive, and out of the 19 we had 6 that showed no clinical signs of EHD. Then came the fawn losses. We lost 33 of 39 fawns. The fawns all died very quickly and very suddenly, all the way through November 3rd.

If there is a silver lining to this scenario we now know that if a mother gets EHD then her fawns will most likely get EHD and they will die as well. We did not have one Mother die that her fawns survived. But, we did have 6 does that showed no clinical signs and all of their fawns lived as well.

It shows EHD definitely has a barrier between the mother and the fawns and the resistance that they show. Some hereditary traits do show resistance. I will not go in to which ones lived or died as that may be different from farm to farm, but on our farm certain genetics with stood the tolerance more so than others!

We have vaccinated for EHD and have a misting system in place. EHD is a very ugly and deadly issue. With that said I am not sure we can control EHD, but we can control the animals it effects and how they are effected, if you get what I am saying. Genetics, facilities, and prevention! These are the things I will be doing in the future at our farm! So not to say that a vaccine won't work, because I hope they find one that does, but that I do not believe in a vaccine and will take other measures until some one can prove to me that there is hope!

I agree on the genetics part,but let the study show what it does before we make conclusions.I also believe it is a combonation of things that work such as weather,animal health,farm location,as well as genetics.EHD is not a disease of the south like it was once thought.We must continue to try and not stand still if an autogensis vaccine does not work we will find out and go from there.I understand the frustration of everyone I too was hit for the last 2 years,but I refuse to stand by and do nothing.If the tests show no increase in tighter levels then so be it.Lets see the results before we say that we do not believe in a vaccine.