“Learning year”: Hunters, wildlife officials navigate year of changes after Washington’s first detection of chronic wasting disease

The detection of chronic wasting disease in a white-tailed deer in north Spokane this summer made Washington the 35th state to confirm the presence of the always-fatal disease.

It also made 2024 a year of big changes for hunters in Eastern Washington.

Shortly after the detection, wildlife officials ordered emergency hunting rules to limit the spread and gauge the scope of the outbreak – mandatory testing, a ban on bait, in-state carcass transport restrictions.

The rules arrived within 10 days of the start of archery hunting, and the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife tried hard to make sure hunters were well aware of what they needed to do to help fight the disease.

Melia DeVivo, a WDFW biologist, said there were some hunters who understood the rules and what needed to be done.

But there were also many who didn’t.

“What we heard generally from hunters was that this was a learning year for many of them,” DeVivo said.

That’s to be expected as hunters begin to get used to their new reality, one where the always-fatal disease is no longer a theoretical threat.

It’s also a threat that’s not going away. More deer have tested positive for the disease, including one in Pend Oreille County, and WDFW officials are talking about making permanent rules to try to contain the disease in the long term.

“It’s here and it’s here to stay,” said Dan Wilson, co-chair of the Washington chapter of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers. “That means it’s really on hunters and everyone else to do what they can to reduce spread.”

CWD attacks the nervous systems of elk, moose and deer. It’s caused by misfolded proteins, called prions, which infected animals shed in their bodily fluids. If it becomes widespread, wildlife officials worry it could decimate cervid herds.

It was a big year for the disease in the Inland Northwest. In addition to the Washington detection, the disease was confirmed in deer in the Idaho Panhandle and in British Columbia.

The deer responsible for Washington’s first case was found dead in the Fairwood area of north Spokane in February. WDFW gathered a sample from it, but it wasn’t tested until July because the Washington Animal Disease and Diagnostic Lab was only taking samples in batches of 90 at the time.

WDFW announced the positive test on Aug. 1. About three weeks later, WDFW ordered the emergency rules.

The new carcass transport restriction proved challenging for some hunters to follow. The rule barred moving carcasses out of WDFW’s eastern region, a 10-county area that stretches from the Oregon border to Canada.

The rule was put in place because carcasses can harbor infectious material, and it’s close to impossible to neutralize the disease-causing prions once they’re in the environment. That means something as simple as hauling an infected carcass across the Cascades poses a threat to deer and elk.

The best practice is for hunters to debone their animal in the field. A similar rule has been in place to prohibit hunters from bringing carcasses from out of state into Washington.

DeVivo said WDFW staff encountered some hunters who were unaware of the rule this fall. When it happened at a check station, they’d have the hunters debone the animal there.

“Most folks were happy to comply,” she said.

Testing participation was up this year, boosted in part by mandatory sampling for all salvaged or hunter-killed deer, elk and moose in game management units 124, 127 and 130. DeVivo said the agency got nearly 2,000 samples over a three-month period. Not all of them were from the three units where it was mandatory, which helped the agency find the case in unit 117.

Hunters had a lot of options for submitting samples. There were check stations during the modern firearm seasons. There were also drop sites available throughout Eastern Washington, and a few other options.

Z Zubrick, president of the board of the Inland Northwest Wildlife Council, spent roughly two days a week pulling samples to give to WDFW. People would call the council office and he would meet them to get the job done. He did as many as seven in one day.

“It was a matter of how can we help the state and (WDFW) in controlling the spread and getting more information,” Zubrick said.

WDFW promised hunters they’d get results in four to six weeks. That’s something DeVivo hopes they can speed up next year, though she noted that the lab seemed to improve as time went on.

The lag time can be agonizing for hunters who decide whether to eat the meat from the animals based on the results. Though there has never been a case of CWD being transmitted to humans, federal health officials advise against eating meat from infected animals.

Woody Myers, the Spokane-based member of the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission and a retired WDFW biologist, dealt with that this fall.

He killed a yearling buck not far from his home in unit 124 – where the disease was first detected – on the last day of the late general season and submitted a test sample shortly thereafter.

Although the deer was close enough to home that Myers drove a tractor to it, he cut the deer up as if he was in the backcountry, taking extra care not to bring bones into his house.

He stored the meat in chunks in his freezer, stopping short of grinding up the cuts he wanted for burger or sausage, and then he waited for the result.

After about three weeks, he said, he got word the test was negative.

Myers had submitted samples in the past, so the process wasn’t exactly new for him. There’s some relief in knowing he can finish processing and eat the deer without worrying about the disease.

But he also said the presence of CWD has changed how he thinks about the deer in his neighborhood. If it spreads widely, he might think about changing where he hunts.

“It’s a little disconcerting to know it’s out there,” he said.