Permit Denied...No Falls Valley Deer Farm in WV

What about fallow deer? There are no documented cases of CWD in them.

I am in Virginia and trying to get Fallow Farming legalized. They do not get CWD or a host of other diseases associated with Whitetails. Elk are so closely related to Whitetails the same arguments apply.

A captive herd of whitetail is the only herd that can be managed for CWD. The wild herd will never be managed for it. Those folks have things backwards - you can test deer that die and you can contain any CWD that might arise in your herd (highly unlikely). The latest issue of Deer Tracking has a good article in it about CWD and the research being done. The mysterious folded prion doesn't just happen like they claim, it is due to either a bacterial or viral infection. It HAS to be. And it follows that it can be treated or prevented then - which of course would give all these wildlife agencies nothing to beat us over the heads with. They prefer to stick their heads in the sand and pretend deer farms are somehow the cause of CWD in the wild herds - more likely the other way around. It just gets my dander up when I hear these absurd theories.

state game managers will always HATE deer farms, We take in hunters that would othrewise have to hunt wild deer, and by doing so they dont have to spend the money on the states hunting license. So the state might lose some money, even though most preserve hunters buy a license to hunt their state, there are probably some guys that dont, and thats what makes the state management agencies mad. deer farms will be under constant threat in every state constantly, we will never get a break, thats why we need to support our deer farm associations to help the fight.

Hunters on high fence ranches in WI do not need a license to hunt. Until we have a vaccine or some other treatment for CWD the wildlife agencies will continue to blame us - like we were to blame for CWD in wild herds in those states that don't even allow deer farming!!! These people are not scientists nor are they vets. If a state would manage their wild herd for quality deer they might get some of those hunters that come to us, but that would mean they would have to admit some of our practices were good ones that actually work.



We have been in business over 15 years and since 2002 have tested hundreds of deer heads with our hunting preserve. Percentage wise we've tested way more than the wild herd has been tested. I believe we would have found a positive if we had one. Some day folks will look back at the idea of killing an entire herd because of one positive as barbaric - because it is. Perfectly healthy deer killed for basically no reason - the same thing that was happening in the CWD zone in WI. Guess what - in that zone today there are more deer than ever!!! What happened to the theory CWD was going to wipe out the deer herd?? What kind of a threat is CWD anyway??? Doesn't look like much of a one to me. Maybe in some way it actually increases the herd - what a theory that would be! CWD should be a non-issue because it poses no threat to the wild deer herd - if hunters want their deer tested they should be able to have them tested - that's it. The rest of the CWD issue is purely political.

the last info I got from the CFIA ( same as the FDA) the vaccine will be a general vaccine to be used in cattle, sheep, elk, deer .... there will be no specific vaccine for each species, I would rather see a rapid live test that you could quarantine for 30 days , take the test and know for certain that the animal coming to your farm was clean.

Wild deer will be vulnerable and our deer won't be if a vaccine is developed. Maybe they will want us to release vaccinated deer into the wild so they have a healthy herd! Like that would ever happen - but it would make sense. They would probably come up with some crazy trap and release program for wild deer so they could vaccinate them - and end up stressing out and killing more deer than the disease ever would. It sure would be an interesting fact to know how many wild deer actually have died of CWD. I think the number would be very small.

I thought that they did catch them with helicopters and nets.

when CWD gets into a "closed, confined" area it infects at an alarming rate, here is the scenario, An infected doe on a farm eats feed out of a trough, feed goes in and some always falls out of it's mouth another deer picks up feed and is instantly infected, when you move deer between pens on your farm it doesn't take long until you expose all the deer on your farm to the disease. In the wild what is the chance of two deer eating the same blade of grass? That is why feeding of deer is banned in endemic areas.

I really haven't seen that substantiated. Why then do some farms only have one positive if it spreads so readily?? You would think some farms would have deer dying left and right - I don't think that anyone is sure how it spreads yet.



As for the netting - they tried it here is WI but ended up cancelling it supposedly due to issues with the helicopter. They asked for volunteers to help but the few people with actual deer experience that said they would help never heard back.

I agree that it is not known for sure how it spreads. We just recently went through a positive CWD case in a hunter killed wild deer here in SE MN. The MN DNR killed and tested approx. 900 deer in that core area and (thankfully) they were all negative. Where did that deer get it??

how about a farm that had around 70 bucks, all but one were positive???

Good question. In that case it would make sense that the prions were possibly being shed thru the saliva. Maybe someday we'll learn more about the disease.

Chad,



To answer your question, your denial includes ALL cervids. We don't have a whitetail license, we have a cervid license. So you can't get any breed of cervids ( this includes elk, red stags and I beleive fallow... among other deer. You CAN get anything outside of the cervid family, which would include buffalo, pigs, sheep and some other non traditional livestock.



Good luck to you, give me a call if I can do anything to help,