this is fine

[ironymaiden]

whitetail deer are probably a reservoir species for covid-19

/insert rant here about how this is what happens when sprawl takes over their habitat

i am horrified for my family in PA. but also, if whitetail are carriers, i don't see why blacktail wouldn't be the same. the island deer population is down but there are still a lot of them living in close proximity in western Washington.

Comments

[dewline]

Based on the research that's come out of PA, the relevant authorities in Ontario and Québec up here in Canada are now watching the local deer populations too.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/ottawa-deer-covid-19-1.6248274

[sara]

What I'd like to understand is how people are getting close enough to deer to give them the plague but they're...not eating the deer. How does THAT work?

[ironymaiden]

well, deer used to come up onto my grandmother's lawn in PA while she was sitting under the tree. nearly close enough to touch. so I can definitely imagine deer being in the path of aerosols.
the deer in the San Juans in Washington are very habituated to people and prior to the recent disease event were EVERYWHERE eating anything that wasn't fenced.

[sara]

Oh, I know it, I've got friends who pulled tags there this year to go thin them out.

[varina8]

Thanks for the article. I'm sorry to read about the virus, though it has to be better for the surviving blacktails.

The islands have had an overpopulation problem since I before moved here, some years worse than others. Even then, they didn't have enough hunters to control the population, although many oldtimers would lay in a deer in the fall, and they have no predators on the islands. In my four years up there, I hit at least six deer with my car. My roommate's Plymouth was known as the deer slayer.