2021 Archive

[alloy]

I took the wrong fork in the road. That's what I get for relying on GPS.

 

[RJSakowski]

I am counting down the minutes here in NY. I closed my shop and wont be open until the 29th.

I was an avid deer hunter for 44 years. Both bow and gun. CWD hit here in 2002 and I quit hunting in 2005. Most of the deer were taken on the farm that I live on so the hunting experience was more relaxed. I would go out about daybreak, come in for an early lunch and then finish the day out. The Ford 8N tractor was our deer hauler, bringing as many as three carcasses back at a time. I kept a log over the years and had totaled up 113 deer with all but three taken in the farm.

CWD and encroaching civilization brought an end to my hunting. Ground zero for CWD was about two miles from us. Current estimated for our region have a 15% herd average and 45% for adult bucks. More recently, my health has also come to play. My hunting tactic was to still hunt. I would see 10x the number of deer and never get cold feet or hands or bored. I figured that if I spotted the deer before they saw me, I had a good chance for a shot and that occurred about 10% of the time so the odds were the same or better.

I miss the hunting. The farm that I used to hunt has been broken up into parcels and a number of new hunters have come in. although I have "perpetual hunting privileges" on most of the property, I don't fancy moving deer for someone sitting in a tree stand. We have about five acres of trees planted and they are large enough now to provide cover. I mow paths through them so we can walk our dog and deer are using the paths. This year, I counted more than a half dozen scrapes. I could set up a stand in the trees but I fear I would be experiencing the boredom and cold feet again.

My health is also coming to play. My eyesight is failing and I have difficulty pulling my 70 lb. bow. I still have my guns and bows but lately, I am having serious thoughts about selling them. We are content nowadays with watching the deet from the office or kitchen windows. Sigh.

 

[Gaffer]

 

[vtcnc]

I was an avid deer hunter for 44 years. Both bow and gun. CWD hit here in 2002 and I quit hunting in 2005. Most of the deer were taken on the farm that I live on so the hunting experience was more relaxed. I would go out about daybreak, come in for an early lunch and then finish the day out. The Ford 8N tractor was our deer hauler, bringing as many as three carcasses back at a time. I kept a log over the years and had totaled up 113 deer with all but three taken in the farm.

CWD and encroaching civilization brought an end to my hunting. Ground zero for CWD was about two miles from us. Current estimated for our region have a 15% herd average and 45% for adult bucks. More recently, my health has also come to play. My hunting tactic was to still hunt. I would see 10x the number of deer and never get cold feet or hands or bored. I figured that if I spotted the deer before they saw me, I had a good chance for a shot and that occurred about 10% of the time so the odds were the same or better.

I miss the hunting. The farm that I used to hunt has been broken up into parcels and a number of new hunters have come in. although I have "perpetual hunting privileges" on most of the property, I don't fancy moving deer for someone sitting in a tree stand. We have about five acres of trees planted and they are large enough now to provide cover. I mow paths through them so we can walk our dog and deer are using the paths. This year, I counted more than a half dozen scrapes. I could set up a stand in the trees but I fear I would be experiencing the boredom and cold feet again.

My health is also coming to play. My eyesight is failing and I have difficulty pulling my 70 lb. bow. I still have my guns and bows but lately, I am having serious thoughts about selling them. We are content nowadays with watching the deet from the office or kitchen windows. Sigh.

Just curious, I didn't think CWD is transmissible to humans. Is that why you stopped hunting?

 

[ArmyDoc]

Just curious, I didn't think CWD is transmissible to humans. Is that why you stopped hunting?

I'm not the OP, but I stopped hunting because it's too much of a hassle to have the deer tested, and I wouldn't feel comfortable eating it it without testing. CWD is a slow virus similar to mad cow disease. There haven't been any documented cases of it infecting humans... yet. The latency period between infection and disease presentation for mad cow can be as long as 30 years, or as short as 18 months.

 

[RJSakowski]

Just curious, I didn't think CWD is transmissible to humans. Is that why you stopped hunting?

AFAIK, there has been no documented case of transmission of CWD to humans. That said, some studies done by UW researchers had shown a jump to othe species. The conditions were drastic, namely feeding brain tissue from infected animals to the subjects, which is not the case for hunting. My take on the matter is that in order for a species jump, two things had to happen; first, there had to be a sizable concentration of the prions present and second, one or more of the prions had to mutate to be able to infect a new species. The probability of a jump would be proportional to the product of the two. For several years, we had our venison tested and of 13 deer tested, only one came back positive. Nontheless. I don't like gambling, especially when my life is at stake. Mad Cow Disease is a kissing cousin of CWD. In the nineties, the UK euthanized its entire population of adult cattle to prevent jumping to humans and causing Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease. The Wisconsin DNR declared the area surrounding us an eradication zone and began issuing unlimited permits with no license required for land owners or if you had written permission from the land owner to hunt.

A second factor was the split up of the original 307 acres into four parcels, of which I ended up with 13 acres. The new owners of two of the parcels were hunters with their own crew of hunters and the third had hunters come in, in exchange for services performed. While I still had hunting privileges, the guys I hunted with no longer did. As I said above, my style of hunting was still hunting which was essentially a one man drive. I didn't mind driving deer to guys that I hunted with, I wasn't keen on driving deer to strangers.

Finally, while initially our main source of protein was venison, we were now in a position where we could afford to buy our meat bur where time was precious. I always processed our venison my self because I didn't like the way the commercial guys did it and there was no economic justification for using a commercial processor. Skinning deer in below freezing weather and spending a half a day de-boning, cutting, grinding, and wrapping could not be justified given our financial position. I have always believed that if I killed an animal, I had an obligation to utilize it to the best possible way.

So, given a combination of those three reasons, I decided to quit hunting. I have to say the the second was the greatest factor. More recently, my failing eyesight and back problems have come to play. It is enough taking the dog for a mile walk nowadays. No way that I would put in wight miles up and down hills. Climate change has also become a factor. Years ago, temperatures could be near zero and there could be a foot of snow. In conditions like those, hunters would be less likely to stay on a stand for more than a few hours. As they moved about, they would move deer. Lately, with warm weather, hunters would stay on the stand. coming on for lunch or possibly the end of the day, Deer don't move during the day as a rule unless something disturbs them. If I go outside during the season now, I will hear a few shots at the break of day and the end of the day with eerie silence for the intervening eight hours.

Forty years ago, the land utilization was mostly farming and hunting parties were comprised of farmers and their extended families. Multiple groups would band together and have mile wide drives crossing multiple farms. This was guaranteed stir the deer. I recall seeing more than thirty deer come past me in one group. In the seventies and eighties, we also had an inordinately high deer density in our area with estimates of over fifty deer per sq. mile largely due to DNR mismanagement. When the DNR finally realized the situation, they began issuing doe permits and eventually multiple doe permits.

When CWD hit us, the DNR declared our area an eradication zone with the intent on killing every deer in the zone. It just kind of took the wind out of the sail. In retrospect, Covid has recently be shown to infect 30% of Iowa's deer herd, implying a high degree of transmissibility and that in a short period of time, Wisconsin will also be seeing similar infection rates. Covid has a much higher probability of spreading into the human population and arguably more serious consequences due to the nature of transmission. I fear that we may be looking at the total eradication of our whitetail herds.

 

[vtcnc]

AFAIK, there has been no documented case of transmission of CWD to humans. That said, some studies done by UW researchers had shown a jump to othe species. The conditions were drastic, namely feeding brain tissue from infected animals to the subjects, which is not the case for hunting. My take on the matter is that in order for a species jump, two things had to happen; first, there had to be a sizable concentration of the prions present and second, one or more of the prions had to mutate to be able to infect a new species. The probability of a jump would be proportional to the product of the two. For several years, we had our venison tested and of 13 deer tested, only one came back positive. Nontheless. I don't like gambling, especially when my life is at stake. Mad Cow Disease is a kissing cousin of CWD. In the nineties, the UK euthanized its entire population of adult cattle to prevent jumping to humans and causing Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease. The Wisconsin DNR declared the area surrounding us an eradication zone and began issuing unlimited permits with no license required for land owners or if you had written permission from the land owner to hunt.

A second factor was the split up of the original 307 acres into four parcels, of which I ended up with 13 acres. The new owners of two of the parcels were hunters with their own crew of hunters and the third had hunters come in, in exchange for services performed. While I still had hunting privileges, the guys I hunted with no longer did. As I said above, my style of hunting was still hunting which was essentially a one man drive. I didn't mind driving deer to guys that I hunted with, I wasn't keen on driving deer to strangers.

Finally, while initially our main source of protein was venison, we were now in a position where we could afford to buy our meat bur where time was precious. I always processed our venison my self because I didn't like the way the commercial guys did it and there was no economic justification for using a commercial processor. Skinning deer in below freezing weather and spending a half a day de-boning, cutting, grinding, and wrapping could not be justified given our financial position. I have always believed that if I killed an animal, I had an obligation to utilize it to the best possible way.

So, given a combination of those three reasons, I decided to quit hunting. I have to say the the second was the greatest factor. More recently, my failing eyesight and back problems have come to play. It is enough taking the dog for a mile walk nowadays. No way that I would put in wight miles up and down hills. Climate change has also become a factor. Years ago, temperatures could be near zero and there could be a foot of snow. In conditions like those, hunters would be less likely to stay on a stand for more than a few hours. As they moved about, they would move deer. Lately, with warm weather, hunters would stay on the stand. coming on for lunch or possibly the end of the day, Deer don't move during the day as a rule unless something disturbs them. If I go outside during the season now, I will hear a few shots at the break of day and the end of the day with eerie silence for the intervening eight hours.

Forty years ago, the land utilization was mostly farming and hunting parties were comprised of farmers and their extended families. Multiple groups would band together and have mile wide drives crossing multiple farms. This was guaranteed stir the deer. I recall seeing more than thirty deer come past me in one group. In the seventies and eighties, we also had an inordinately high deer density in our area with estimates of over fifty deer per sq. mile largely due to DNR mismanagement. When the DNR finally realized the situation, they began issuing doe permits and eventually multiple doe permits.

When CWD hit us, the DNR declared our area an eradication zone with the intent on killing every deer in the zone. It just kind of took the wind out of the sail. In retrospect, Covid has recently be shown to infect 30% of Iowa's deer herd, implying a high degree of transmissibility and that in a short period of time, Wisconsin will also be seeing similar infection rates. Covid has a much higher probability of spreading into the human population and arguably more serious consequences due to the nature of transmission. I fear that we may be looking at the total eradication of our whitetail herds.

Sadly, I think your story is a very familiar one for most hunters. Northeast states have suffered the same land division issues. I'm not so sure about CWD, as I am not a hunter, but father is one. I'll have to ask him about CWD in Vermont. He was out this weekend, about 4" of snow in central VT and NO deer in sight.

 

[RJSakowski]

I'm not the OP, but I stopped hunting because it's too much of a hassle to have the deer tested, and I wouldn't feel comfortable eating it it without testing. CWD is a slow virus similar to mad cow disease. There haven't been any documented cases of it infecting humans... yet. The latency period between infection and disease presentation for mad cow can be as long as 30 years, or as short as 18 months.

CWD isn't a virus but a prion which is a protein fragment. It is not living but can replicate in a similar fashion to DNA. As such, it is extremely hard to destroy. While heating above 160º, UV radiation, or alcohol can destroy a virus, it has no effect on the prions. This is what makes them so dangerous.

 

[mmcmdl]

I am counting down the minutes here in NY. I closed my shop and wont be open until the 29th.

I'm sure there will be some blood spilled on my property Brent . I let the neighbors hunt my land in exchange for keeping an eye on the place . Last time I was up this late in the year I froze my ****s off !

 

[higgite]

I'm still waiting for the punch line.

Tom