Rebecca Humphries, Director of the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Chair of the Association’s Fish and Wildlife Health Committee, testified yesterday on behalf of the Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee on the issue of threats to fish and wildlife sustainability from diseases and pathogens.
Director Humphries reflected on the utility of the Association-developed “National Fish and Wildlife Health Initiative” as an approach to addressing this national issue; and addressed the state-federal collaboration on the management of Chronic Wasting Disease as a model to approaching animal diseases that affect both free-ranging fish and wildlife, and domestic animals. Humphries also shared her experiences of managing CWD, Bovine Tuberculosis and Viral Hemorrhagic Septicemia in Michigan.
“The dramatically growing importance of fish and wildlife health issues in natural resource management makes it imperative that more human, financial and technological resources can be directed toward them in the future,” said Humphries.
To learn more about the National Fish and Wildlife Health Initiative, go to http://www.fishwildlife.org/about_comm_fwhealth.html.
Read Humphries full testimony >
Showing posts with label CWD. Show all posts
Showing posts with label CWD. Show all posts
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Friday, October 10, 2008
Michigan Natural Resources Commission Approves Deer Baiting and Feeding Ban for Lower Peninsula
The Michigan Natural Resources Commission on Thursday, Oct. 9 voted unanimously to approve a permanent ban on deer and elk baiting and feeding in the Lower Peninsula.
Michigan Department of Natural Resources Director, Rebecca Humphries, issued an interim order placing an immediate ban on baiting and feeding on Aug. 26, after a captive deer from a privately owned facility tested positive for chronic wasting disease. Humphries’ order, as prescribed by the state’s CWD emergency response plan adopted in 2002, would have expired Feb. 26, 2009, but the NRC action removes the expiration date and makes the ban permanent.
Additionally, the NRC approved orders that require hunters who take a deer in the nine townships that comprise the CWD Surveillance Zone in northern Kent County to come to a DNR deer check station. The orders also regulate the movement of carcasses from the Surveillance Zone and give replacement kill tags to any hunter who presents a deer at a check station that shows signs of CWD.
The NRC action is just the latest effort in a campaign designed to prevent the spread of CWD, an always fatal neurological disease of deer, elk and moose.
Since Sept. 1, DNR conservation officers have issued 102 tickets for illegal deer and elk baiting in the Lower Peninsula.
“There has been talk that we weren’t going to be able to enforce this baiting ban in the Lower Peninsula, but the number of tickets we have issued so far shows that we are very serious about enforcement of the ban,” said Humphries. “Our primary goal is to protect the health of our wild white-tailed deer and elk populations. Stopping CWD from becoming established in our wild deer and elk is our top priority.”
“We appreciate the hunters who have abided by the ban and are no longer baiting,” Humphries added. “Protecting the resource -- white-tailed deer and elk -- should be everyone’s priority.”
The DNR’s Law Enforcement Division reported that in a period from Sept. 22 to Oct. 5, 34.6 percent of the calls to the Report All Poaching(RAP) hotline concerned illegal baiting. Last year during a similar time frame, baiting complaints made up only 11.3 percent of the RAP hotline calls. While there was no baiting and feeding ban in 2007, the complaints last year would have related to over-baiting or baiting in the Bovine Tuberculosis zone in northeast Lower Michigan.
“We are encouraged that sportsmen and women are taking part in this initiative,” Humphries said. “We appreciate them taking the health of our deer herd as seriously as we do.”
Since the CWD-positive deer was discovered, the DNR has tested 1,095 deer statewide; of those, 964 tested negative with the remaining 131 tests are pending.
The DNR is committed to the conservation, protection, management, use and enjoyment of the state's natural resources for current and future generations.
SOURCE: Michigan DNR
Michigan Department of Natural Resources Director, Rebecca Humphries, issued an interim order placing an immediate ban on baiting and feeding on Aug. 26, after a captive deer from a privately owned facility tested positive for chronic wasting disease. Humphries’ order, as prescribed by the state’s CWD emergency response plan adopted in 2002, would have expired Feb. 26, 2009, but the NRC action removes the expiration date and makes the ban permanent.
Additionally, the NRC approved orders that require hunters who take a deer in the nine townships that comprise the CWD Surveillance Zone in northern Kent County to come to a DNR deer check station. The orders also regulate the movement of carcasses from the Surveillance Zone and give replacement kill tags to any hunter who presents a deer at a check station that shows signs of CWD.
The NRC action is just the latest effort in a campaign designed to prevent the spread of CWD, an always fatal neurological disease of deer, elk and moose.
Since Sept. 1, DNR conservation officers have issued 102 tickets for illegal deer and elk baiting in the Lower Peninsula.
“There has been talk that we weren’t going to be able to enforce this baiting ban in the Lower Peninsula, but the number of tickets we have issued so far shows that we are very serious about enforcement of the ban,” said Humphries. “Our primary goal is to protect the health of our wild white-tailed deer and elk populations. Stopping CWD from becoming established in our wild deer and elk is our top priority.”
“We appreciate the hunters who have abided by the ban and are no longer baiting,” Humphries added. “Protecting the resource -- white-tailed deer and elk -- should be everyone’s priority.”
The DNR’s Law Enforcement Division reported that in a period from Sept. 22 to Oct. 5, 34.6 percent of the calls to the Report All Poaching(RAP) hotline concerned illegal baiting. Last year during a similar time frame, baiting complaints made up only 11.3 percent of the RAP hotline calls. While there was no baiting and feeding ban in 2007, the complaints last year would have related to over-baiting or baiting in the Bovine Tuberculosis zone in northeast Lower Michigan.
“We are encouraged that sportsmen and women are taking part in this initiative,” Humphries said. “We appreciate them taking the health of our deer herd as seriously as we do.”
Since the CWD-positive deer was discovered, the DNR has tested 1,095 deer statewide; of those, 964 tested negative with the remaining 131 tests are pending.
The DNR is committed to the conservation, protection, management, use and enjoyment of the state's natural resources for current and future generations.
SOURCE: Michigan DNR
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