CWD discovered in Culpeper Co, Va.
 

This will be a game changer for me this year. Late last year they discovered a buck that was shot in culpeper last year had CWD. It didnt show any outward signs of it, but a mandatory random test from deer turned in to area taxidermists came up positive. Now instead of just checking in our deer on line, we have to take them to a CWD check station for them to do a sample. Culpeper is a big county and they have not yet even stated where these check stations will be located. Cannot remove carcass from the county, meat must be de-boned first.

We all knew something was causing the population to drop as we have been seeing about a third of the deer we normally see. I guess the coyotes have been cleaning up the carcasses as we have not seen many. The thing that is confusing to me is the VDGIF has also made culpeper an "earn a buck" county so now we must kill a doe before we can shoot a second buck and then shoot another doe before we can shoot a third buck if I am reading the regs correctly. We have been trying to leave the does alone since the population has dropped so much, but now we are being forced to shoot does. Doesnt make much sense to me but I dont make the rules.

Will just have to adapt and change the way we go about our business. We have been spoiled the past twenty years with extremely liberal seasons and bag limits, especially for does. You get three doe and buck tags each year and you can buy additional doe tags, two at a time, unlimited. They wanted to knock the population down and with the liberal seasons/bag limits, coyote/bear predations and disease, they have have been very successful. I guess change is inevitable.

It appears no one cares about the spread of CWD. What a shame!

People will care when it hits near them. I dread when it will show here in Vermont. With the story told by the OP that outbreak was suspected but not confirmed until mandatory tests were done. Here in Vermont, because we have such a small Department with limited funding, I almost think they don't want to dig in and look for that news. When it does show it will result in spending to test animals killed in the area and then will result in less license sales all of which will bankrupt the Department. CWD has been confirmed in New York 5 hours away down near Syracuse first in a game farm, then in the wild and at a game farm in Quebec which is only a couple hours away from our northern border so it is almost inevitable that it will soon show within our Green Mountains. Game changer....for sure.
What Vermont did do to slow the chances of it showing up is to ban all game farms, ban supplemental deer feeding, and not allow any harvested whole carcass deer,moose or elk to be brought into Vermont from a contaminated area. It was only a decade or so that CWD was never east of the Mississippi River and now it is in more states than not.

Banning deer farming is a good start, they are the ones who brought it across the Mssissippi and the ones who brought it into PA and spread it in PA by moving their skanky deer around the state. I wish PA would shut them all down.

It is always about the dollars OT. I can imagine there are more than a few game farms in PA and probably have been for years. Look at who the clients are and most likely are people with a lot of financial strength. Those people are often business people who can and do influence the various legislative bodies they come in contact with. My bet is there have been private lobbies whose main job is to keep the game farms open.Vermont grandfathered the 2 and decided no more could be given permits mainly as a hedge o stop CWD from showing up. The 2 owners saw the handwriting on the wall and decided to close which ended that business in Vermont hopefully for good. My guess is we already have it here in Vermont but the wardens and biologists aren't looking too hard to check.

Funny thing about CWD is you don't find it unless you test for it. Was't new york state the super dupper CWD stoppers a year ago huh now the have it lol Biggest problem is they have no idea what they are doing whether its new or just something that was already there !!!

It wasn't there until it came in with some infected deer at a captive facility near Rome New York. Soon enough it spread to the wild deer herd since in most cases there isn't any way to actually have a secure fence. I'll add it was a few years ago that it showed up in NY. Think it was last year it showed in Quebec. Coming to a state near everyone...soon

You are correct, changes come and you just have to adapt and go on doing what we do. It really threw a kink in my routine when they implemented the zones and all the changes here in the eastern panhandle of WV. My cabin was on one side of the "line" (a highway) and my house was about 200yds on the other side of the line. I couldn't take a whole deer across that line to my house without deboning and such. So much for my processing area that I took pride in getting set up in my shop. They eventually moved the line, extending the zone which fixed that problem. Just keep up with all the rules every season because they will most certainly alter/add to them as their research develops.