# Opinions on the T.B. zone



## everlast1

You hit outa the park. Right on. Your absolutely right about the deer herd. And I'd like to be the one to kill the last kirtland warbler. Thousands of acres that would comeback in popple and support all kinds of wildlife so 3 tree huggers can see a bird. Please. I cant believe the hunters in this state stand for this crap.


----------



## solohunter

marty said:


> I would love to know why the took "Soil Samples" from a rye patch??? sure seems strange you never heard anything back?? They didn't leave in black helicopters did they??:yikes:


the deer had been eating in the rye patch when i put an arrow thru it, as had alot of deer, and he left in a blue MSU plated pickup,
last time they took a neighbors cattle herd they took soil samples from barn area, pasture, pond/pughole in pasture,water samples from drinking trough, and a few other gathering sites for the cattle,,,,and they hauled away his entire herd- five years ago, last month they took his new herd.


----------



## solohunter

and as far as the fewer deer testing positive, they are testing a much larger area, more deer on the "fringe area" so testing a much larger number of deer and outside the core area will reduce the number of positives by percentage, baffling us with numbers,,, this is a government operation!


----------



## TrekJeff

Are there any current finds for this year on TB? Six years ago a classmate of mine did an extensive non-bias study of TB in Michigan. His report was very interesting, especially since it wasn't swayed from one interests or another. I could see how damaging this must have been to the business's in the area, land value and over all economic situation. My grand father's cousin has property in Hillman, nothing has ever been reported as far as TB coming off his property. So I'm just wondering how much of a presence it actually has in the herd today.


----------



## wildcoy73

just so you know marty the deer report card came back the other day no tb and no cwd and was aged out at 2 1/2 years so thats 4 deer that we have taken from your place with no tb problems. now if we could keep people from shooting deer with 22 and bird shoot all are deer would have been clean of everything. i personally think this tb thing has gotten out of hand. someone must want to buy all of north east michigan and offered the dnr alot of money first kill off the salmon, than the smelt now the deer next it will be the turkies. they have already taken your children and grandchildren form that area for a young couple can not make a living anymore no people = no money


----------



## marty

well that's good to know. I didn't even test my deer this year. In fact there's never been a TB deer around here. I hope that wire around my place does something. maybe claymores next


----------



## wildcoy73

hey this winter we'll pull out some m16 and start firing them off on the property line keep that up for a bit and every one well think we fliped out and not dare cross the sine maybe we'll have ya run around in a hot pink thong that should do the trick and for the deer they well be just as lost and walk right with ya:lol::lol:


----------



## solohunter

I talked to the DNR rep at the check station n curran saturday while turning in a head and he related three deer with" suspicious signs" that had been turned in this week, he obviously cant say by looking at them yes or no so the correct answer is/was "suspicious" he had no info from the Mio station, will wait till the end of the year to see if they post results by area.


----------



## jig head

my property is one parcel from being out of the tb zone. that puts me in the corner of 071.
my neighbors in cheboygan co bait and pull the few deer we have right out of my food plots. but before deer season there are some deer
like these in sept.

















then after the neighbors that can bait legaly start baiting, the deer leave.
the area I am in was the 452 several years ago and was leased to hunt clubs. I heard that there were 3000 hunters per year in the 30,000 plus acre gated area I am in and when it was 452 they shot everything that was brown. now that it has been divided up and sold off we are trying to build the herd up by food plots, clear cuts, etc. it is painstakingly slowly starting to pay off.


----------



## Hamilton Reef

Editorial: Curbing TB to revive deer hunting

The deer herd in northern Michigan is down. The number of deer killed during the firearms hunting season is down. The number of hunters is down. But the number of deer infected with bovine tuberculosis -- which led to smaller herds in the first place -- is up. So what is a DNR to do?

http://www.record-eagle.com/opinion/local_story_360093007.html?can_view=361183300


----------



## solohunter

I see they posted the results of the state kill before the season was over?? that is another great indicator they are inept and their reporting is a GUESS! kinda an accounting issue i would guess,,, maybe after the season is over they will find another 10 million dead deer they overlooked??
highway overpass counting of deer on rooftops,,, just require us to report all deer killed and get a sticker to validate our kill tags with three days?? dont have to bring in the deer, just the completed tag to get a sticker on it? deer check stations can scan the info with the PDA in seconds and hand out a validation sticker?? way to simple for them to think about.

They need to make hunting in NM more attractive to increase the kill numbers, or suffer thru the issue that the cattle (Bovine) gave the TB to the deer (Cervids) when they allowed the deer herd to get way to large and forced them to feed with the cattle to survive the winters. 

Untill the TB goes away and the economy goes up, fewer hunters will kill fewer deer, and that means only shooting bucks rather than taking a chance on a TB infected doe in northern mich. I think they are screwed.


----------



## Beaverhunter2

"He [the CO] said the lack of baiting has helped a lot as well as more anterless permits. "

What lack of baiting?!? The BP where the Curran Deer Check Station is sells bait- right in the heart of 452. We have property in the middle of a large tract of private land south of there and the equation is pretty simple- those that bait see deer. The rest of us that don't- don't! 

Yes,the population is down- that was by design. But it seems like the DNR turns a blind eye to the illegal baiting because they know it will help _keep_ the population down. 

If nobody baited, the remaining deer would be forced to move to eat. But with the violators still doing their thing, they kill deer while the law-abiding hunters watch the squirrels and the chickadees. I'm trying to get my daughter into (legal) deer hunting. When I was her age (12) we'd see 10 - 15 deer per day. This season in three days of hard hunting we saw 2. Her perspective on deer hunting: 

"It's kind of boring."

Since then I've added another 6 days on my own and how many more deer have I seen? None. And we're supposed to be recruiting more young hunters???????

I guess we'll just have to stick to squirrel hunting and trapping. :sad:

John


----------



## e. fairbanks

Baiting continues "unabated" in the TB Zone. From the 2006 Bovine TB Conference, Dr. Steven Halstead, Michigan State Veterinarian- "The recent identification of seven TB cattle herds raised the question of why these herds were found when there was so much time with no evidence of bovine TB IN CATTLE IN THE MODIFIED ACCREDITED ZONE. IT APPEARS WE DO NOT FULLLY UNDERSTAND THE COMPONENTS INVOLVED IN TRANSMISSION OF BOVINE TB AND SUSTAINING THE INFECTION WITHIN A POPULATION " The solution proposed by the august body was the time honored appointment of an "outside "task force" a (study group) to study the "big picture" and "advise on focus areas"
The 2006 percentage of TB infected deer in 452 was 2.3%. A study made on deer heads from 452 revealed that the bovine TB organism could be cultured from 1% of the heads that exhibited no visible lesions of infection.There are approximately 500 sq. mi. in 452. Lets say there are 25 deer per sq. mi. 12,500 deer times 3.3%--there could be 400 TB infected deer in 452 !!


----------



## DANIEL MARK ZAPOLSKI

i shot 5 deer this year in alcona county( 28n/8e ) and all showed NO SIGNS OF TB. 4 of which have been tested and proven with no TB:evil: the 5th just got turned in on 12/27/07. out of all the deer shot in that area since 2001:evilsmile at least 23 deer(thats all i think i have patches for) have no sign and have been tested negative for TB.:coolgleam


----------



## James Dymond

TB has been found in the herd of charolais just north of Comins and they are all condemned I was told today, sucks to be a farmer in area 452. Jim


----------



## solohunter

H Trader in curran ( 452) is waiting for his herd to be taken again, one positive in OCT,,, I arrowed a positive deer a mile from him in 99 
from second hand report the cow that tested positive was one that was born on his farm 1 1/2 year ago, the parent did not test pos.?? this is the seocnd time he has lost his herd,,,


----------



## TheManInBlue

I am in Iosco county which is one county south of a TB zone and have been either with my dad who was hunting or on the property since 88. We manage aprox 300 acres and have yet to have an animal test for TB. I know we are south of the actual zone but wouldn't you think we would see one by now? We practice our own QDM which this year was 4 or more on one side and previously was 6 or bigger on both. We took 8 doe to two buck and i would have liked to have filled my one other doe tag but didn't have the time unfortunately. Bottom line is the TB will never get better until they deal with the source ie the cattle. You can't stop deer from grazing where cattle feed.


----------



## vantolr

A group of us hunt public land in Iosco. We haven't changed our hunting practices much. We normally take 1-2 bucks and about 4-5 does per year, not filling all of our doe tags. Normally only shoot a mature doe, leaving the bambies for another year.

So far, we have not seen an TB in the lungs, chest cavity, etc. and DNR have not found any based on the head results. 

Have noticed that the overall population has remained pretty stable from year to year. Have not noticed any severe reduction in overall numbers, despite the heavier pressure and more liberal doe permits.


----------



## solohunter

My positive deer DID NOT HAVE VISABLE lung LESIONS !!!! it had one lesion on the stomach paunch, 1/4 inch yellow nodule, lungs and cavily were clear,,,,,


----------



## codybear

As long as you have deer period, you WILL have nose-to-nose contact even without baiting. Sure you may be able to minimize it with no baiting but it wont stop it from happening.. 

For example, I am in the middle of the TB zone. I cammed these 2 bucks and 2 other bucks sparring for over an hour in my food plots and during that time they stuck there noses in each others face numerous times. I guess knowbody thought of that, eh?

There are also Doe's that pick-up stray fawns and as you know a Doe will will ocassionaly groom her fawn by likcing their faces (I have that on film as well)..

Baiting is only one factor for helping transmit it, there are many others that they have absolutely no control over. However, they sure do like to point the blame as it being mainly focused on just the baiting, dont they?










CB


----------



## swampbuck

just one question, Who is willing to be #2 ?

Awhile back there was an article on the guy from T.C. who has cwd. Who would like to be #2 on that one also?


----------



## solohunter

e. fairbanks said:


> 'There is no evidence" - the scientific society loves to use this expression.
> There is no evidence that any human M. bovis infection has occurred on any of the 40 some farms where the cattle were infected.(or the infected deer farms) There is no evidence that any of the hundreds of people who process deer or the DNR personnel who handle and test the deer heads have been affected.
> There is the 1 hunter of the hundreds (perhaps thousands) of hunters who have dressed infected deer and/or eaten the meat of infected deer.
> ANY QUESTIONS ?


Sure, Would you knowingly feed yourself, your wife, kids, or grandkids meat from a deer you knew was TB positive? and as a side note,, try and feed it to me and it will take two doctors and a magician to remove it. :yikes:


----------



## Direwolfe

CWD is going to be the real scary scenario. Most TB can be cured with antibiotics etc. While there is still denial that CWD can jump species to man, its a bigger risk IMO. If it jumps to man there's no cure for it.


----------



## marty

Direwolfe said:


> CWD is going to be the real scary scenario. QUOTE]
> 
> Scary like what. I hear people say this but hasn't states had CWD for years like colorado and it's still on the map. Hunting is alive and well in other places as well. West va just got a couple positive CWD deer and now it seems ho-hum. My dad still lives there and says you hear nothing more about it anymore:lol:
> 
> When west va got the first postive they didn't go crazy and eradicate the entire herd off either. Seems they had a few postives and that's been it no mass slaughter of their deer herd :lol: and no mass die off as well


----------



## Direwolfe

The disease will have almost no direct effect on the deer. A small percentage will get it and live long enough to die from it. Its scary in the sense of whether to eat the meat of the deer you kill. Some think it won't jump the species barrier, some think it will and has. Most don't have a clue of what the question is. In the UK some still question whether BSE (mad cow ) caused the higher than background rate of CJD (don't ask me to spell it, sounds like Creutzfeld-Jacob Disease). Its hard to tell here in the USA whether CWD caused the CJD found in some western hunters. Given that the incidence of the disease is so rare its hard to use statistics. Personally, the chance is high enough that I wouldn't want to take the risk on my children (the in-laws on the other hand...). Would you take the chance?

How will public perception of hunting change if a) a larger portion of hunters don't eat their kills and b) those furry creatures carry a disease that can kill humans? I think livestock farmers will take a more strident view on allowing deer to contact their herd.

Will more than a negligable % of hunters stop hunting because of the risk of eating the meat?


----------



## marty

Direwolfe said:


> on my children (the in-laws on the other hand...). Would you take the chance? Not if I knew an area had any disease like CWD :yikes:I wouldn't eat any meat nor would I give it to anyone same as I won't eat the fish from certain ne mich lakes cause I know what's in the water
> 
> How will public perception of hunting change if a) a larger portion of hunters don't eat their kills and b) those furry creatures carry a disease that can kill humans? I think livestock farmers will take a more strident view on allowing deer to contact their herd.
> 
> To be honest I could care less what the public thinks of me cause I eat my kills and so do my kids:evil: If CDW was ever so bad where we had to shoot all the deer off and dump them in land fills the public wouldn't like that either. What I stating is CWD is not the monster everyone makes it out to be.
> 
> Other places have and has had CWD for eons and still have hunting and all the people haven't died off from the disease.
> 
> 
> 
> Will more than a negligable % of hunters stop hunting because of the risk of eating the meat?


 it didn't stop the hunters from hunting when TB was found in the deer herd. What keep hunters from this area is the lack of deer:yikes:


----------



## e. fairbanks

E-Coli Cases Spark Hamburger Patty Recall
cbsnews.com/stories/2007/09/29/health/printable3311502.shtml
21.7 MILLION POUNDS OF HAMBURGER RECALLED
How about E. COLI IN SPINACH ?
THEN THERE WAS THE MAD DEER BANQUET 3/13/2005 in Verona, New York
300 + people enjoyed venison at a wild game dinner- the donated deer later proved positive for CWD
MERCURY IN FISH,


----------



## Direwolfe

Marty,

I'm not sure I understand your post. You inserted your comments in a "quote" of my post. Your first comment is that you would not eat any meat from a CWD area. You later state you don't care about public opinion because you eat your kills. 
If Michigan (when) has CWD in its herd, your first comment implies you wouldn't use the meat and would presumably change your second comment to the extent you would no longer eat the meat (you still may not care about public opinion but that's entirely up to you.). Would the presence of CWD change anything about your hunting activities in MI? (how much time devoted, how many deer killed?) Do you and/or your father eat the meat from kills in WV and why? Don't take offense at this post, I am just curious how other hunters see the effect (or lack of effect) of CWD if it got in the MI herd.


----------



## marty

Sorry about that Bottom line is if I hunted in an area high in positives I would not eat nothing from that area. I hunt and eat meat from the TB zone for years now although we had no positives which is why I do eat it.

Now if you want to talk about lakes i fish on I would not eat the fish from them cause I know what's in that lake nor would I feed any to my family.:yikes:

My dad does not hunt anymore just tells me what he reads in the paper anout CWD in west va deer herd. Talking about CWD I just don't see the sky falling attitude some hunters have. Many states have it and they still have hunting today. Take wisc I can't remember the last news we heard from them.

Yes cwd may come but as TB it may be something we may just have to live with like it or not.


----------



## marty

e. fairbanks said:


> E-Coli Cases Spark Hamburger Patty Recall
> cbsnews.com/stories/2007/09/29/health/printable3311502.shtml
> 21.7 MILLION POUNDS OF HAMBURGER RECALLED
> How about E. COLI IN SPINACH ?
> THEN THERE WAS THE MAD DEER BANQUET 3/13/2005 in Verona, New York
> 300 + people enjoyed venison at a wild game dinner- the donated deer later proved positive for CWD
> MERCURY IN FISH,


yep worried about cwd:lol: try eating the hamburger off your local store shelf there's been enough recalls on beef this year:lol:


----------



## quackencrazy

The title of this thread is "Opinions on the T.B. zone" and that is what I will offer. My family raises cattle on a farm just south of the TB zone. We are also deer hunters. We have used crop damage permits to help control the deer population when it was necessary to do so. 

TB is a real disease that exists in the deer herd. It has also been found in livestock. I don't think it matters which species had it first. The state has spent 10 years and millions of dollars on this issue. For deer hunters, TB has affected the way we hunt. For farmers, TB has affected our livelihood. I think there are things that both the agriculture community and the hunting community can do to help eradicate TB. 

Every bovine animal in Michigan is tagged with a radio frequency identification ear tag before it leaves the farm. These tags allow 24-hour complete traceback of any animal if it is found to have TB or any other disease. Random herd tests continue. I think farmers need to do a better job of keeping deer away from their cattle and the cattle feed. 

I think the hunting community needs to realize that deer hunting is a sport, not a guarantee to hang a buck or fill the freezer. We need to enjoy deer hunting for the sport that it is. We don't all need to shoot a deer every year. We don't need to see a deer every time we go into the woods. Let's enjoy the hunt, the comaraderie, and the tradition that is Michigan deer hunting. 

We know that TB is a disease that is spread between animals by nose to nose contact. Common sense says that when we bait and feed deer we increase the amount of nose to nose contact. For this reason I think we should stop all baiting and feeding of deer. I propose for the long term health of our state's deer and cattle herd that we have a state-wide ban of baiting and feeding deer on all properties at all times. By feeding deer, we are spreading the disease. We need to let nature run it course. We need to let the sick animals die, and then allow a healty deer herd to return to a managable number that the land is capable of supporting without human assistance from feeding.


----------



## wildcoy73

to feed or not to feed that is the question to be had. deer touching nose to nose happens without feed i am a baiter and have never seen a deer touching nose in my bait pile. but when i hunt farm feild i do see them touching and playing around so do we tell the farmers to quit planting feilds? no! tb is going to always be in michigan thanks to some bad cattle. we will live with it i have hunted in the tb zone and know family members that still hunt it and we have never had one deer test positive for tb so i do not see a problem with it it like people and aids it was a big deal back in the 80s and now you don't hear much about it. to get our deer population in control the state would need to allow hunters to hunt theese farms. if a farmer says he needs block permits to control the state deer from mowing down his crop than let him have them but also let the farmer know that 75% of his permit will be mailed out to the michigan hunter and he will be required to allow these hunters to control the population or loose his rights to block permits. this step alone will put down many more deer and the deer that are harvested will be put to good use


----------



## solohunter

sad reading but ;

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 
CONTACT: Bridget Patrick, MDA, (517) 241-2669

January 24, 2008 

Mary Dettloff, DNR, (517) 335-3014 

State Designates Potential Bovine TB High-Risk Area in Iosco County

LANSING - The Michigan departments of Natural Resources (DNR) and Agriculture (MDA)
today announced that routine bovine Tuberculosis (TB) testing has identified two
TB-positive deer in Iosco County from the 2007 hunting season. As a result, MDA
designated two "Potential High-Risk Areas" near the southern boundary 
of bovine TB Zone where the deer were harvested.

In addition, a deer harvested during the late antlerless season in Shiawassee County,
which is located more than 100 miles to the south of the TB Zone, may be positive
for bovine TB. The DNR is waiting for final test results before it can confirm 
the deer was bovine TB positive.

"We have routinely designated potential high-risk areas in the past. These
designations are dropped after six months of disease surveillance testing if no 
bovine TB is found," said MDA State Veterinarian Dr. Steven Halstead. "There
are approximately 90 farms within the two 10-mile areas around the Iosco County 
deer and 100 farms around the suspect deer in Shiawassee County." 

MDA and the United States Department of Agriculture will be contacting producers
to schedule whole-herd bovine TB tests before the animals go out on spring pasture.

The DNR is awaiting laboratory confirmation on a 1-1/2 year-old hunter-harvested
doe from Shiawassee County that had lesions compatible with bovine TB. The animal
is considered a suspect, but has not been confirmed as a bovine TB-infected animal.
Although the confirmatory tests take several weeks, MDA would like to begin scheduling
whole-herd tests in a 10-mile radius around that deer as well. If laboratory results
are negative for bovine TB, MDA will cancel the scheduled tests.

"The deer taken in Shiawassee County will be subject to genetic testing to 
confirm the county of origin," said Rebecca Humphries, DNR director. "DNR,
working in conjunction with Michigan State University, collected biological samples
from deer all over the state and is able to determine a deer's origin to a particular
county."

The DNR conducts annual surveillance testing in hunter-harvested deer, testing more
than 8,000 deer in 2007. The DNR has examined approximately 4,400 deer from Iosco
County and 370 deer from Shiawassee County since 1998.

Since the TB eradication effort began, all of the state's one million cattle
have been tested for the disease, with no TB found in cattle outside the bovine 
TB Zone. To date, the DNR has tested over 161,886 wild white-tailed deer, with 587
testing positive for bovine TB. Strategies adopted by the DNR to reduce bovine 
TB in the wild white-tailed deer have reduced the prevalence rate of the disease
from the high in 1995 of 4.9 percent to 2.3 percent in 2007.


----------



## traditional

quackencrazy said:


> The title of this thread is "Opinions on the T.B. zone" and that is what I will offer. My family raises cattle on a farm just south of the TB zone. We are also deer hunters. We have used crop damage permits to help control the deer population when it was necessary to do so.
> 
> TB is a real disease that exists in the deer herd. It has also been found in livestock. I don't think it matters which species had it first. The state has spent 10 years and millions of dollars on this issue. For deer hunters, TB has affected the way we hunt. For farmers, TB has affected our livelihood. I think there are things that both the agriculture community and the hunting community can do to help eradicate TB.
> 
> Every bovine animal in Michigan is tagged with a radio frequency identification ear tag before it leaves the farm. These tags allow 24-hour complete traceback of any animal if it is found to have TB or any other disease. Random herd tests continue. I think farmers need to do a better job of keeping deer away from their cattle and the cattle feed.
> 
> I think the hunting community needs to realize that deer hunting is a sport, not a guarantee to hang a buck or fill the freezer. We need to enjoy deer hunting for the sport that it is. We don't all need to shoot a deer every year. We don't need to see a deer every time we go into the woods. Let's enjoy the hunt, the comaraderie, and the tradition that is Michigan deer hunting.
> 
> We know that TB is a disease that is spread between animals by nose to nose contact. Common sense says that when we bait and feed deer we increase the amount of nose to nose contact. For this reason I think we should stop all baiting and feeding of deer. I propose for the long term health of our state's deer and cattle herd that we have a state-wide ban of baiting and feeding deer on all properties at all times. By feeding deer, we are spreading the disease. We need to let nature run it course. We need to let the sick animals die, and then allow a healty deer herd to return to a managable number that the land is capable of supporting without human assistance from feeding.



Best Post yet. You can see both sides of the issue. I think TB has been dispersing under the radar all along. If it ever gets into the heart of farmcountry and starts effecting human food, deer are in trouble. We should all realize this. We as hunters better start doing our job. We need to stop putting up baricades and start building communication bridges.


----------



## solohunter

new zelands issue with TB managment,,

http://www.gw.govt.nz/section922.cfm

possums,,,,,,:yikes:


----------



## vgawel

wildcoy73 said:


> to feed or not to feed that is the question to be had. deer touching nose to nose happens without feed i am a baiter and have never seen a deer touching nose in my bait pile. but when i hunt farm feild i do see them touching and playing around so do we tell the farmers to quit planting feilds? no! tb is going to always be in michigan thanks to some bad cattle. we will live with it i have hunted in the tb zone and know family members that still hunt it and we have never had one deer test positive for tb so i do not see a problem with it it like people and aids it was a big deal back in the 80s and now you don't hear much about it. to get our deer population in control the state would need to allow hunters to hunt theese farms. if a farmer says he needs block permits to control the state deer from mowing down his crop than let him have them but also let the farmer know that 75% of his permit will be mailed out to the michigan hunter and he will be required to allow these hunters to control the population or loose his rights to block permits. this step alone will put down many more deer and the deer that are harvested will be put to good use


 


your joking i hope. you should never have any right to go on a farmers property because the state says so. i think we should realize that the farming side of this is a little more important than our 2 month hobby


----------



## wildcoy73

vgawel said:


> your joking i hope. you should never have any right to go on a farmers property because the state says so. i think we should realize that the farming side of this is a little more important than our 2 month hobby


joking no! farmer are the biggest complainer about the michigan deer herd. so if they want to control the herd than allow people that love to hunt and will put the harvest to use do it. remember it was a farmer (cattle) that brought tb to the area and we must suffer from that. well i guess we could make every farmer put a 12 foot high fence around thier property but they must push the state deer off first. remember we the people own the deer not the farmer that keeps pushing for the dimise of our deer herd


----------



## solohunter

ah, the biggest complainers about our deer herd are the car insurance companys, second would be the farmers with the smaller wallets, and to toss a little more gas on the fire, they are not your deer, or my deer, they belong to the governer,,,, our beloved state. there for we must obtain written permission ( license) from the state before even attempting to hunt their deer, and robin hood was a flat out poacher/violator/non sportsman.


----------



## M1Garand

wildcoy73 said:


> to feed or not to feed that is the question to be had. deer touching nose to nose happens without feed i am a baiter and have never seen a deer touching nose in my bait pile. but when i hunt farm feild i do see them touching and playing around so do we tell the farmers to quit planting feilds?


The problem here though is the potential for nose to nose and disease transmission through saliva is greatly increased when bait piles are involved. By law, a bait pile is supposed to be dispersed over a 10 x 10 ft area. Many don't even do that and we end up with a bunch of deer nuzzling around an area of only a few feet. I see it all the time in the game cam photos. With fields, deer are dispersed over a much greater area, so any chance of nose to nose or saliva transmission are much, much less. What I would like to find out is the life of TB outside the body, as in if a deer leaves saliva on a plant/bait pile, how long can it live and be transmittable?


----------



## vgawel

wildcoy73 said:


> joking no! farmer are the biggest complainer about the michigan deer herd. so if they want to control the herd than allow people that love to hunt and will put the harvest to use do it. remember it was a farmer (cattle) that brought tb to the area and we must suffer from that. well i guess we could make every farmer put a 12 foot high fence around thier property but they must push the state deer off first. remember we the people own the deer not the farmer that keeps pushing for the dimise of our deer herd


 

famers livelihood vs your hobby, you are way out of line. how are you suffering. people who have lost there cattle multiple times (income). maybe you could make the state put up a 12 foot fence. stay on state land staring at your pile of carrots, maybe thats why you shoot baby bucks. and keep spreading the disease to every animal that eats of your bait.


----------

