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FRANKFORT, Ky. (Oct. 10, 2022) — Five counties in western Kentucky remain under special regulations for deer disease monitoring during the 2022-23 seasons.
Last year, the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources established a special Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) Surveillance Zone in Calloway, Marshall, Graves, Fulton and Hickman counties after a deer nearby in Tennessee tested positive for the disease. Chronic wasting disease is a disease fatal to deer and elk.
While the disease has not been found in Kentucky, special regulations designed to help Kentucky Fish and Wildlife detect and contain any potential spread of CWD are ongoing. Surveillance zones could be expanded if CWD spreads to new areas; the latest information is posted online at fw.ky.gov/cwd.
Disease monitoring regulations in place this season for the CWD Surveillance Zone in western Kentucky include:
Season dates and bag limits have not changed in the five counties that comprise the surveillance zone.
Hunter participation is vital to disease monitoring efforts. The current validated test for CWD did not detect the disease in the more than 4,300 samples collected from deer in the surveillance zone from March 1, 2021 – March 2, 2022.
Excellent check station compliance by hunters helped Kentucky Fish and Wildlife collect the majority of those samples in the CWD Surveillance Zone.
To obtain an adequate sample size for testing this year, Kentucky Fish and Wildlife will be operating 13 mandatory, in-person check stations within the CWD Surveillance Zone. A map and list of check station locations are available online through fw.ky.gov/cwd and are included in the 2022-23 Kentucky Hunting and Trapping Guide, available online at fw.ky.gov or wherever hunting licenses are sold.
All deer harvested in Calloway, Fulton, Graves, Hickman and Marshall counties by any method during the following dates in 2022 must be brought to a CWD Check Station for sampling:
Check stations will only operate on these dates. There is no mandatory deer check station requirement outside of these dates.
Telechecking a deer and knowing the general location where it was harvested before arriving at a check station will help expedite the check station process.
Archery and crossbow hunters, muzzleloader hunters and landowners hunting on their own property also must bring their deer to a check station during these dates. All deer should be telechecked before coming to the check station.
Check stations will operate from 9 a.m.-7 p.m. (Central). Hunters may bring in an intact deer carcass, a field-dressed deer or just the head of the deer for sampling at a check station.
Department staff at each check station in the CWD Surveillance Zone will ask for the 1-mile grid location where the deer was harvested. The location information is confidential and used by Kentucky Fish and Wildlife to determine areas where additional CWD surveillance may be needed.
To help hunters know the grid number associated with their hunting spots, the department has created a “Know Before You Go" interactive map, available online at fw.ky.gov/cwd. Staff will record the grid number at the check station.
Since 2002, Kentucky Fish and Wildlife has CWD-tested nearly 40,000 deer and elk from every county in the state.
It increased sample and testing goals in all of the commonwealth's border counties this year.
Recently, the department announced that it will operate three voluntary CWD Check Stations for deer or elk in Bell and Harlan counties. These will operate on Nov. 12-13, Nov. 19-20 and Nov. 26-27. Hunters will receive free animal aging and CWD testing for the deer or elk brought to the check stations.
Any hunter wanting their deer tested at no cost also can use a self-serve voluntary Deer Sample Collection Station. These are found at several locations throughout the state and will accept samples during all deer seasons. Go online to fw.ky.gov/cwd for a map of sites. Only the deer head is needed for sampling; instructions, bags and tags are located at each sampling site. The grid location will be needed for any deer heads dropped off at a Deer Sample Collection Station.
Special regulations in the five-county CWD Surveillance Zone also prohibit the use of grain or mineral blocks to bait deer. This helps prevent deer from concentrating, which increases spread of disease. Bird feeders in yards, planted food plots and normal agricultural practices, including mineral blocks or feeding cattle, are allowed. Hunters can still use scent attractors.
Kentucky Fish and Wildlife no longer requires a special carcass tag for deer harvested in the CWD Surveillance Zone. However, hunters must still immediately complete their harvest log prior to moving the carcass and telecheck their deer by midnight on the day the animal is recovered and prior to processing the carcass.
Carcasses, intact heads or other high-risk parts of deer harvested within the CWD Surveillance Zone may not be taken outside of the zone. Only de-boned meat, antlers, antlers attached to a clean skull cap, a clean skull, clean teeth, hides and finished taxidermy products may be taken out of the CWD Surveillance Zone.
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