As a young boy growing up in rural Missouri, many days were spent outdoors enjoying wild places and wild critters. At a young age, I became fascinated with the graceful ghost of our forest, the white-tailed deer. This fascination fueled a life-long pursuit to learn everything I could about this iconic species. After graduating high school, the decision to align this passion with career pursuits was natural. It turned from an outsized fascination to a professional pursuit that led me on a decades long journey studying and researching white-tailed deer management across the southern U.S., eventually leading to an opportunity to “come home” and serve as the private-lands deer biologist for the Missouri Department of Conservation. This was truly a dream come true for a small-town country kid with a passion for deer management and conservation of our natural resources.
The dream would turn to dread in February 2010 when chronic wasting disease (CWD) was first detected in our state. By that time, CWD had been known to occur in eastern Colorado and Wyoming since the 1960s and was slowly spreading east across the great plains. It had been detected in Wisconsin and Illinois eight years earlier. Long-term studies of CWD on mule deer populations in the west were beginning to show the destructive impacts on those herds. Research over the last 20 years has continued to demonstrate that, if left unmanaged, CWD will increase in prevalence and distribution leading to increased mortality in deer populations.
As with many diseases, early detection and aggressive management have the greatest impact on the future distribution of the disease. So we embarked on an aggressive strategy to minimize the likelihood of spreading the disease within Missouri (i.e., increased safeguards for the importation of captive deer from outside of Missouri and carcass movement restrictions). Using science to inform management actions, we liberalized local harvest opportunities, prohibited the use of feed and minerals that unnaturally concentrate deer, and implemented localized targeted removals in an effort to minimize the number of infected deer on the landscape (a strategy that Illinois had utilized with measurable success).
Aggressive management actions implemented by cooperating hunters, landowners, and agency staff over the last decade have been successful in slowing the number of infected deer on our state’s landscape. Unfortunately, CWD has continued to be introduced to new parts of the state and spread where it was previously detected.
Some will say CWD is simply a political disease that has not impacted deer populations, but this couldn’t be farther from the truth. Scientific studies have continued to demonstrate that CWD is a fatal disease that, if left unchecked, will increase in prevalence resulting in increased mortality on local populations that significantly alter buck age structure and the ability of the population to recover from other natural factors like extreme droughts and other disease outbreaks like EHD. Others recognize that CWD is a serious threat but disagree with the approach we have implemented to address the disease.
Regardless of where you stand on the issue of CWD, most share the same goal—a healthy sustainable population of deer in Missouri that can be appreciated and utilized by future generations. I certainly hope that my son (and hopefully grandchildren one day) will continue to have the opportunity to utilize and appreciate a healthy and thriving deer population into the future. The white-tailed deer is the heartbeat of Missouri’s wild places—familiar, resilient, and woven into our outdoor heritage. It is also a symbol of the success of wildlife conservation and restoration across North America.
The Missouri Conservation Commission, and subsequently the Missouri Department of Conservation, were created by the citizens of Missouri to restore and manage our valuable fish, forest, and wildlife resources. There is no species more emblematic of this conservation success than the white-tailed deer.
As CWD has spread in Missouri over the last decade, MDC’s objective has been and continues to be to keep CWD infection rates low to protect the long-term health of the deer herd. This extensive undertaking can only be accomplished by working collaboratively with hunters and landowners to achieve both surveillance and management goals. MDC has continued to work with hunters and landowners to adapt the management tools, including creating CWD management permits and simplifying regulations. Last year, we piloted the Hunter Harvest Initiative to encourage additional deer harvest during deer season to alleviate the need for post-season targeted removal.
We remain committed to keeping our deer herd heathy and working collaboratively with the hunters and landowners that are critical to our conservation mission. We cannot be successful in this work, and at the scale needed, without hunters’ and landowners’ support and participation.
At this time, MDC will be pausing our post-season targeted removal efforts to work with hunters and landowners to adapt and identify a more sustainable path forward.
Future generations of Missourians are counting on us to work together to sustain the future of one of our great state’s most important natural resources. Together, we can preserve the health of the herd and the future of hunting; divided, we may lose it.
We are committed to continuing our engagement with hunters, landowners, and Missourians on this hard work ahead. Feel free to send your thoughts to [email protected].
In gratitude,
Jason Sumners
Director, Missouri Department of Conservation
