Terrible news

For deer hunters today

SOMEBODY said 300,000 Arkansas hunters hit the deer woods this time of year. (To repeat the question asked by a city slicker many years back: “Is that where they keep the deer?”)

One state. One season. Three hundred thousand people. And that doesn’t include all those who come from out of state to hunt here. So you might tack on a lot more.

To sum up: Deer hunting is a big deal.

It’s a big deal economically. And not just to sellers of guns and ammo. Think about all the little kitchens spread out all over the hills that get a great part of their incomes on weekend mornings during the season. And the mom-and-pop stores that sell gasoline and Cokes. Not to mention all those who enjoy eating venison.

“Not to mention” is a way to get us to mention something. The way Nixon would say “incidentally” when he thought his next statement was anything but incidental. Deer steak, deer chili, deer burger in cowboy stew … . There are families who need the protein to supplement their meals. And some of us just enjoy a good crockpot venison stew.

But the state received some awful news on this front last week: The Associated Press reported that chronic wasting disease—CWD, as the papers call it—has been found in southern Arkansas. Deep in southern Arkansas. Near the Louisiana line.

Until now, CWD has been mostly confined (or we thought) north of the Arkansas River. Everybody knew it would eventually get over the river, but some of us hoped it would take years to do so. You know, a deer exposed to the disease would somehow make it across the river, and there’d be a case discovered in Prairie or Monroe County, or perhaps in the west at Garland or Polk County. And folks would worry. And the next year it’d end up in Jefferson or Clark. And folks would worry. And eventually all over the state. And folks would worry.

But the AP says a deer with the disease was “harvested”—euphemism for killed—in the Felsenthal National Wildlife Refuge. That’s in Union County. That’s as far south as our counties go.

According to the story: “The source of CWD found in the Arkansas deer is unknown as the nearest known positive case was 120 miles away in Issaquena County, Miss., and is more than 200 miles from the nearest known positive case in Arkansas . . . . ”

Which means unless some hunter moved an infected deer carcass from north Arkansas to south Arkansas (frowned upon, indeed, by the state) then a deer, or series of deer, has walked it to the Louisiana line. And the source of CWD, which causes extreme weight loss and confusion, is spread along the ground between points A and B. There is no cure. There is no way to combat the disease once loose. And although nobody thinks that CWD has jumped to humans as of yet, the Centers for Disease Control recommends against eating the meat of an infected deer. This news is beyond bad.

It could change many things about the state. Including drying up deer camps and hunting in the fall.

Folks would worry. And have reason to.