Northeastern U.S. deer more susceptible to wasting disease than those to the west

Date:  June 6, 2019

Source:  Penn State

Some deer are more susceptible to chronic wasting disease that is spreading through herds of white-tailed deer across much of the United States, according to Penn State researchers, who have identified a panel of genetic markers that reliably predict which animals are most vulnerable to the contagious neurological disorder.

"The genetic variants that would make deer less susceptible to chronic wasting disease are in much lower frequency in the East, likely because they weren't needed," said David Walter, adjunct assistant professor of wildlife ecology. "Over a long period of time, their survivability may have been somehow favored by losing these genotypes. They weren't important until a disease like chronic wasting disease showed up. We have seen that deer with the more susceptible genotypes are in the majority."

Over the last decade or so, Walter's research group in the College of Agricultural Sciences has been studying how the movement, behavior and genetics of wild deer are affecting the spread of chronic wasting disease. Often referred to as CWD, it is a fatal prion disease affecting the deer family, and belongs to a group of similar diseases, such as mad cow disease and scrapie in sheep, called transmissible spongiform encephalopathies.

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No more deer in the headlights: Study finds large mammals do use road crossing structures

White-tailed deer and mule deer particularly likely to use road underpasses

Date:  November 17, 2017

Source:  Frontiers

Summary:

A pilot study finds that large mammals are more likely to use wildlife crossing structures than move past a random location in the surrounding habitat. Animal movement also varied between crossing structures in different locations, suggesting that location might be more important than design. These findings are a first step towards a better understanding of the effectiveness of wildlife crossing structures.

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Many white-tailed deer have malaria

First-ever native malaria in the Americas

Date: February 5, 2016

Source: University of Vermont

Two years ago, Ellen Martinsen, was collecting mosquitoes at the Smithsonian's National Zoo, looking for malaria that might infect birds--when she discovered something strange: a DNA profile, from parasites in the mosquitoes, that she couldn't identify.

By chance, she had discovered a malaria parasite, Plasmodium odocoilei--that infects white-tailed deer. It's the first-ever malaria parasite known to live in a deer species and the only native malaria parasite found in any mammal in North or South America. Though white-tailed deer diseases have been heavily studied--scientist hadn't noticed that many have malaria parasites.

Martinsen and her colleagues estimate that the parasite infects up to twenty-five percent of white-tailed deer along the East Coast of the United States. Their results were published February 5 in Science Advances.

In hiding

"You never know what you're going to find when you're out in nature--and you look," says Martinsen, a research associate at the Smithsonian's Conservation Biology Institute and adjunct faculty in the University of Vermont's biology department. "It's a parasite that has been hidden in the most iconic game animal in the United States. I just stumbled across it."

The new study, led by Martinsen, was a collaboration with scientists at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute, the American Museum of Natural History, the National Park Service, the University of Georgia, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee--and UVM biologist and malaria expert Joseph Schall.

Read on …

Reducing deer populations may reduce risk of Lyme disease

Date:

July 1, 2014

Source:

Entomological Society of America

Summary:

Reduced deer populations can lead to a reduction in Lyme disease cases, researchers in Connecticut have found that after a 13-year study was conducted. White-tailed deer serve as the primary host for the adult blacklegged tick (Ixodes scapularis) -- the vector for Lyme disease. The study found that the number of resident-reported cases of Lyme disease per 100 households was strongly correlated to deer density in the community.

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Coyote predation on deer in Eastern U.S. manageable, research suggests

Date:

May 9, 2014

Source:

Penn State

Summary:

Coyotes are a major predator of white-tailed deer across the East, especially fawns born each spring, but wildlife managers nonetheless are able to stabilize and even grow deer herds, according to researchers. Coyotes -- Canis latrans -- are a relatively recent arrival to eastern North America, appearing first in the region in noticeable numbers in the 1970s. They are a significant source of deer mortality and most often prey on whitetails in the earliest months of their lives. Coyotes have long inhabited the American West.

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