4/15/2002
Division of Wildlife
CWD FACT SHEET
This is a timeline of events leading to the Division of
Wildlife's culling of wild deer and elk on the Western Slope of Colorado to
control the spread of chronic wasting disease.
-The Division of Wildlife made the decision in Jan.
2002 to depopulate all wild deer and elk enclosed within Motherwell Ranch, a
private captive wildlife facility northeast of Meeker and south of Hayden (12
miles east of Hamilton), because the facility contains domestic elk. The wild
deer and elk were either trapped in the facility when fences were built last
summer, or found their way over or beneath the fences once the facility had
been enclosed. The DOW has a long-standing policy that wild animals that have
been enclosed with captive animals should not return to the wild because of
concerns about their contracting disease from the captive animals.
-From Jan. 9-13, the DOW conducted a public hunt within the
fenced facility and killed 176 wild deer and elk. All deer and elk killed by
the public were tested.
-From Jan. 14-31, Motherwell ranch employees guided
public hunters and killed an additional 50 wild deer and elk. All deer and elk
killed by the public were tested for CWD.
-From Feb. 1-16, DOW employees killed an additional 147 wild
deer and elk on the ground and 33 wild deer and elk from a helicopter. All
deer and elk picked up were tested for CWD.
-Two wild deer from within the Motherwell fenced
facility were found to have CWD. In both cases, the animals were harvested by
public hunters. The DOW then made the decision for DOW employees to do
sampling around the Motherwell ranch, with a goal of killing and testing 300
animals. This number was based on statistical analysis done by DOW research
and wildlife protection staff, and chosen based on deer per square mile and to
have a sound statistical sample to determine if the disease exists in the
area.
-From April 1-3, 16 DOW employees and three U.S. Department
of Agriculture Wildlife Service employees with a helicopter killed 308 deer
within a five-mile radius of the Motherwell Ranch from the ground and air, and
seven from within the facility.
-On April 8, two more CWD-positive deer were found
among those 308 killed the previous week outside the Motherwell facility.
Following guidelines from the DOW's Northeast Region, where CWD is endemic,
DOW personnel on the ground killed 18 additional deer in the area where the
two positive animals were found in the wild. This was done on the afternoon of
April 9 and finished the morning of April 10. Preliminary testing of those 18
animals late Friday found one with CWD.
-At the Wildlife Commission workshop held in Greeley
on April 11, the Commission was briefed in detail on the DOW's past actions to
contain CWD and what was planned for the next week.
-On April 12, after much discussion between the DOW's
wildlife protection and public service staff and its leadership team, the DOW
made the decision to remove more deer specifically from within the five-mile
radius where the deer with CWD had been found in the wild. However, the
control effort was not for sampling as was done previously, but to kill as
many wild deer and elk as possible in an attempt to eradicate CWD from within
the area before deer and elk start migrating back to their summer range.
-Beginning April 15, DOW staff, U.S. Department of
Agriculture Wildlife Service personnel and volunteers from the Mule Deer
Association, the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, the Traditional Bowhunters
Association, the Colorado Outfitters Association and the Colorado Bowhunters
Association will kill as many deer and elk as possible, ending on Friday,
April 18 All of the deer and elk will be tested for CWD. The role of the
volunteers is to assist with hauling the animals from the field to the staging
area, where all animals will be tested for CWD and then incinerated.
Division of Wildlife <http://wildlife.state.co.us>
