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Ehd time again?

To put some perspective on the impact of EHD - below are total 2017 harvest numbers for the top 10 EHD impacted counties to date ( I couldn't locate 2018):

2017 harvest / 2019 EHD
Warren - 2,767 - 460
Clarke - 1,921 - 90
Madison - 2,849 - 61
Polk - 1,085 - 43
Lucas - 2,106 - 35
Marion - 2,148 - 32
Monroe - 2,036 - 23
Decatur - 1,766 - 22
Dallas - 1,389 - 11
Appanoose - 2,009 - 11

Warren's reported EHD kills are fast approaching 20% of normal annual harvest numbers.


That is scary. Hard to figure out why Warren has been hit so hard?
 
To put some perspective on the impact of EHD - below are total 2017 harvest numbers for the top 10 EHD impacted counties to date ( I couldn't locate 2018):

2017 harvest / 2019 EHD
Warren - 2,767 - 460
Clarke - 1,921 - 90
Madison - 2,849 - 61
Polk - 1,085 - 43
Lucas - 2,106 - 35
Marion - 2,148 - 32
Monroe - 2,036 - 23
Decatur - 1,766 - 22
Dallas - 1,389 - 11
Appanoose - 2,009 - 11

Warren's reported EHD kills are fast approaching 20% of normal annual harvest numbers.
Good info but the DNR reported numbers are not even close to reality. 75%+ kill off in warren is a real possibility.
 
So what's so different about Warren County this year? Why is it getting hit the hardest? If we could only answer these questions then maybe a solution could be determined. I really feel for the landowners and hunters in these areas.
 
that would be a devastating result if that materializes - wow.
One guy finds 20 in a 3 mile stretch of river this weekend. Talk to another in the know source and deer are straight up GONE. I'd be surprised if the number isn't over 2,000 already. Talk to another guy that doesn't want to leave his house cuz smell is so bad.

Madison lost 85% on 2012 in many parts. Warren well on it's way in 2019 with many other highly impacted counties.

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Ouch, that would be deflating. Is the die off about over now or will this continue till it freezes?
Dying ever day. I found one over the weekend that wasnt there 16 hours earlier.

Frost will kill the midges but deer will keep dying until spring 2020. Some will get sick but survive but be too weak to survive the winter.

Bad deal.

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One guy finds 20 in a 3 mile stretch of river this weekend. Talk to another in the know source and deer are straight up GONE. I'd be surprised if the number isn't over 2,000 already. Talk to another guy that doesn't want to leave his house cuz smell is so bad.

Madison lost 85% on 2012 in many parts. Warren well on it's way in 2019 with many other highly impacted counties.

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What does the Madison County herd look like in 2019 after losing 85% in 2012?
 
What does the Madison County herd look like in 2019 after losing 85% in 2012?
I've had this discussion often with lots of different people. Most hard core guys will say that it is just now getting back to what it was as far as age structure. Numbers have been there for a couple years.

From personal experience... 2014 was my first year here and it was really tough to find mature deer those first few years.

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With how much more common EHD seems to be this past decade anyone thing that maybe this is something that has been released or purposely imposed by man? Quite the conspiracy theory, but honestly it would not surprise me.

I wondered this myself recently. Lord knows that the insurance folks and many farmers would be ecstatic if all of the deer were gone.
 
Again, I am sorry to hear about these big losses, it is kind of hard to process. FWIW, I was all around my place this past weekend in Davis County and did not see any sign of EHD. I did smell "death" once and looked around and only found a pile of turkey feathers. I know of one neighbor about 1 mile south of me that found an apparent EHD kill about 2 weeks ago and have heard that another neighbor has found some, around 5, but he has properties all over and I am not sure that these would even be in my County or anywhere close to me.

At any rate, for the devastation that is going on in Warren County...a couple of counties away, it is apparently nowhere that. I agree that it would be great to isolate the factor(s) present in Warren and try to learn more about this.
 
To put some perspective on the impact of EHD - below are total 2017 harvest numbers for the top 10 EHD impacted counties to date ( I couldn't locate 2018):

2017 harvest / 2019 EHD
Warren - 2,767 - 460
Clarke - 1,921 - 90
Madison - 2,849 - 61
Polk - 1,085 - 43
Lucas - 2,106 - 35
Marion - 2,148 - 32
Monroe - 2,036 - 23
Decatur - 1,766 - 22
Dallas - 1,389 - 11
Appanoose - 2,009 - 11

Warren's reported EHD kills are fast approaching 20% of normal annual harvest numbers.

Great stats, thanks for putting them together
I looked back on this thread and found estimates to multiply reported by 10, 30, and 50 to get actual. Just taking the low end would mean 4,600 dead deer in Warren as 460 reported in the map today.

The harvest is generally around 50% of the population. Using 2017 numbers, that means a herd in Warren around 5,500 deer.

If those are anywhere close to accurate, for tags should be pulled for Warren in my opinion.
 
Lucas, Madison, Clarke & Decatur- I’ve personally seen or found 29 so far. Yes, im outdoors every day & doing farm stuff daily. 99.99% sure ehd. Lot of areas & counties but I was not looking & covered very little area, if I had to put an “acreage amount” to it.... “ less than 250 acres” be my guess. FWIW, I think a typical iowa county is maybe 300,000 m/l acres.

I guess me personally, I’ve found 3% of the state’s ehd deaths myself if it’s around a thousand.

I’m either the unluckiest guy in the state or the # of ehd deaths is pretty sizeable & unfortunate.
 
Pulled a mature buck out of pond yesterday. Watched another mature buck come into pond and wade around drinking water like a dog that’s been running for miles. Should find him in next couple days.
 
Wow this really sucks. Every time this happens seems like it’s way more prevalent in southern IA than anywhere else in the state. Like 2012 was REAL bad in Madison co. and now this year it’s looking horrible for Warren co.

I hunt in eastern Iowa we have a lot of rock lined creeks, but not all of the creeks are like that. One property I hunt has 100+ cattle on it with a sand/mud bottom creek and I have never found a dead deer in or around it. Another place I hunt has close to 200 head of cattle with 4-5 small ponds that never seem to be plum full. Maybe I’m just lucky and there’s no EHD midges around the farms I hunt.

IDK what the solution is but it’s very alarming, and in my opinion is way more impactful than CWD. I hope we can find a solution sooner rather than later.


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Question from an outsider looking in....

Since it was mentioned that 20-30 years ago you didn't see this kind of outbreak....

In the last 20-30 years, has there been a lot of new ponds / water holes created or opened up? I guess what I am curious to know, is if your good black soil up there is a blessing and a curse. If the midges are around the muddy banks of ponds, and more ponds / water holes have opened up, it would be easy to see how this would create an environment for this to spread like wildfire.

From SW Missouri here, and we have average soil at best, with rocky water ways and ponds (throw in some red clay too). Our EHD outbreak a few years ago wasn't near of what I hear about up in Iowa or from what I saw when hunting northern Missouri.
 
What gets me is all the hype and fear mongering that was/is put into the CWD to add a few seasons and wipe out some targeted areas, now we have a real problem and you hear very little from the DNR. Where are the town hall meetings now? What IS their game plan?
 
I hunt a lot in southern Michigan (have a farm in west central IL too). We have far more deer in southern mi than pretty much most of IL and I’d never heard of EHD in our MI herd until 2012. Even then, southern mi wasn’t hit all that hard compared to the central part of the state. Haven’t heard of an ehd case since 12 either.

Couple thoughts/question I’ve always had-
Seems the consensus is that this midge from muddy river or pond flats is what is always attributed to the problem. So I’ve not understood why pin/deer farmers that I assume can control exactly how their deer intake water (and I assume can set up their pins nowhere near ponds/rivers) still suffer ehd outbreaks?

Along those same lines and pertaining to some of the minerals out there that help herd health and thereby supposedly help reduce ehd....again, farm raised deer are genetically superior, fed the most premium diets/minerals money can buy, have little to no stress factors like a wild deer does, get a variety of vaccines/medication and yet they STILL get ehd in many deer farms across this country.

Just not convinced we know anything about it much less possible ways to fight it. Not even convinced there’s not more to it than just “a midge and mud”.

Thoughts?
 
I hunt a lot in southern Michigan (have a farm in west central IL too). We have far more deer in southern mi than pretty much most of IL and I’d never heard of EHD in our MI herd until 2012. Even then, southern mi wasn’t hit all that hard compared to the central part of the state. Haven’t heard of an ehd case since 12 either.

Couple thoughts/question I’ve always had-
Seems the consensus is that this midge from muddy river or pond flats is what is always attributed to the problem. So I’ve not understood why pin/deer farmers that I assume can control exactly how their deer intake water (and I assume can set up their pins nowhere near ponds/rivers) still suffer ehd outbreaks?

Along those same lines and pertaining to some of the minerals out there that help herd health and thereby supposedly help reduce ehd....again, farm raised deer are genetically superior, fed the most premium diets/minerals money can buy, have little to no stress factors like a wild deer does, get a variety of vaccines/medication and yet they STILL get ehd in many deer farms across this country.

Just not convinced we know anything about it much less possible ways to fight it. Not even convinced there’s not more to it than just “a midge and mud”.

Thoughts?

CWD is much more common in farmed cervids. The roots of CWD can be traced back to Colorado State University exposing captive Mule Deer to sheep infected with Scrapie.

EHD is a totally different thing, and has always “been around” but to some others’ points, outbreaks seem to be more frequent and severe now; I personally subscribe to the theory that cattle contribute to the spread of EHD.


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