By Jessica Domel
Multimedia Reporter

The Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission approved four new chronic wasting disease (CWD) zones and directed Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD) staff to develop a plan to reduce zone sizes and lift zones after certain milestones have been met.

“If we’re going to live with CWD, until we get a solution for it, we just have to be more thoughtful on these regulations,” Commission Chairman Jeffery Hildebrand said.

New surveillance zones were approved for Kimble, Medina and Cherokee counties after cases of the neurological deer disease were discovered in deer breeding facilities in those counties.

A new surveillance and containment zone were implemented in Coleman County after a free-ranging, hunter-harvested buck tested positive for CWD in late 2023.

TPWD received 193 public comments on the proposed zones prior to their adoption.

Four percent of commenters agreed with the proposal, 81% disagreed and 15% disagreed with specific parts of the proposal.

Members of the commission and the public spoke at the commission hearing.

“They (the zones) strike me as being too large, and we’re having maybe some additional negative impact that we maybe should have,” Commission Vice Chairman Oliver Bell said. “We do need to have some type of containment, but can we shrink that? I see sometimes how much acreage is impacted or how many landowners are impacted, and it kind of sends a shiver down my spine.”

The CWD zone in Kimble County encompasses 90,000 acres on 83 properties.

The zone in Medina County is 21,000 acres from 110 properties, while the Cherokee County zone is about 13,000 acres from 463 properties.

The combined containment and surveillance zones in Coleman County span around 150,000 acres on more than 200 properties.

The surveillance zones extend two miles from a breeding facility where a deer has tested positive for CWD.

“When we had the detection in Duval County, it’s been a couple of years, we started out with a much larger zone,” Alan Cain, TPWD big game program director, said. “At the direction of the commission, we ended up shrinking those down to just a two-mile zone to really focus the zone size to reduce the impact on landowners but focus our surveillance and sampling efforts right around where the positive detection occurred.”

Containment zones extend five miles beyond where a positive free-ranging deer, or other CWD susceptible animal, was harvested.

“That’s the average dispersal rate of a yearling buck,” Cain said. “If you had deer right around where the positive is, they might disperse out five miles from there. That gives us some idea if there’s a positive in there, we’ve kind of got them contained.”

All properties that are wholly or partially contained in the two or five mile radius are included in the zones.

TPWD uses roadways, waterways or other landmarks to mark the edges of zones to make it easier for landowners and hunters to determine whether or not they’re in a CWD zone.

The Texas Deer Association, Deer Breeders Corporation and others spoke out against the proposed zones.

The deer association asked the commission to remove all zones.

“Zones are painful for landowners. They’re painful for hunters. They’re painful for future hunters,” Kevin Davis, TDA executive director, said. “My question is, and it’s an earnest and real question, what do we really need them for? When they were adopted in 2012, we didn’t have the tools we have today. We didn’t have live testing. We didn’t have a hundred percent surveillance model.”

CWD zones were created to mitigate risk, Davis said, and one of the risks was the movement or non-movement of live deer. And he said, that’s been mitigated now.

“If we do carcass disposal rules, which are not restrictive, we also mitigate that risk,” Davis said.

Some commenters said the zones are a deterrent to hunters and can have a negative impact on landowners.

One hunter who supported the zones is Judson Brown. He also serves at the secretary for the Texas Chapter of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers.

“CWD is a very real threat to the health of our native white-tailed deer populations, and the spread of CWD is a risk for our hunting heritage and those who wish to engage in that over the long-term,” Brown said. “I do applaud the commission for taking consideration of the action, and I support that, but I do urge the commission and the Parks and Wildlife Department to continue to take further actions to be aggressive in preventing the spread of CWD throughout the state.”

The Texas Wildlife Association also expressed their support.

“The establishment of these zones in Kimble, Medina, Cherokee and Coleman counties are well within the state’s existing CWD management plan, which has proven measurable positive results in curbing spread of the disease,” Andrew Earl, TWA’s director of Conservation, said. “Nothing in recent months would warrant a departure from this practice.”

The association encouraged the department to continue to seek opportunities to simplify CWD regulations.

“(We) do not support doing so at the expense of disease management and traceability,” Earl said. “I am just as frustrated as so many others to be standing here talking about the establishment of new CWD zones this morning; however, until circumstances change and the state has a new path forward, there’s no reason to alter course.”

Chairman Hildebrand directed TPWD staff to develop a preliminary solution to reduce the size of CWD surveillance and containment zones and discuss how they can be removed after certain milestones without a CWD detection are met.

“If carcass disposal needs to be a part of the discussion at the next meeting, I’m absolutely willing to entertain that, but you have to give me something on the other side so it’s a thoughtful process, and not just more regulation,” Hildebrand said.

The next regular commission hearing is March 27-28.

The commission approved the creation of the four new CWD zones unanimously.

Maps of the zones will be posted on the TPWD website and in the Outdoor Annual.

According to TPWD, CWD is a fatal, neurological disease that impacts members of the deer family, including white-tailed deer and mule deer.