Wildlife officials are set to hold a town hall to present options on mitigating the spread of Chronic Wasting Disease after a cluster of cases — the first in B.C.'s history — were identified near Cranbrok over the last year.
The presentation will be led by provincial wildlife biologist Holger Bohm and biosecurity expert Jessica Russel, as both will be speaking about managing and responding to CWD in the region.
The provincial government has confirmed a fifth positive case of CWD in the Kootenays, with four of those cases relatively clustered near Cranbrook.
A CWD awareness and information session is planned for Cranbrook on March 13, 2025, at 7 pm in the Heritage Inn.
The event is being hosted by the East Kootenay Wildlife Association (EKWA), with support from the B.C. Wildlife Federation (BCWF), the Kootenay Wildlife Heritage Fund, the Big Game Records Club of BC, Backcountry Hunters and Anglers of BC, and the Oceola Fish and Game Club.
“With new cases being confirmed in the Kootenay region, this is a perfect time for conservationists and interested citizens to review what has been done to date and what other options are available to slow the spread of CWD,” said Glenn Flynn, past president of the EKWA and a director at the BCWF.
Bohm, a wildlife biologist and ungulate specialist for the Ministry of Water, Lands and Resource Stewardship, will present an overview of the provincial government’s CWD management plan. His work has focused on large mammals through more than 20 years in wildlife management in Europe and Canada.
Recent research and other CWD mitigation strategies will be presented by emergency management and ecology consultant Jessica Russel, who has proven success working on national-scale programs.
Russel’s presentation “Approaches to managing Chronic Wasting Disease: What we've learnt from elsewhere and what it means for B.C.” will review the situation in B.C., disease management principles, and ways to get ahead of the spread of CWD.
There will be an opportunity to ask questions of the experts after the presentations.
“While prevalence remains very low, the B.C. Wildlife Federation believes we have an opportunity to take decisive action to limit its spread,” said BCWF Executive Director Jesse Zeman. “The BCWF is committed to working with the province to improve our response and management of CWD. The recent study conducted in Wyoming concluded that hunting is the best tool for managing CWD, meaning B.C. has the tools and opportunity to keep prevalence low.”
So far, CWD cases in B.C. are confined to the Kootenays, which presents an opportunity to use hunting pressure to help control its spread.
A study released in January led by U.S. government biologist Wynne Moss found that “maintaining hunting pressure on adult males is an important tactic for slowing CWD epidemics within mule deer herds.”
Meanwhile, the province recently completed a CWD sampling program for urban deer in Cranbrook and Kimberley. The goal was to collect samples from 100 deer in each community to test for disease prevalence within urban herds.
Results from that program are pending.
CWD affects cervids, such as deer, moose, elk and caribou, and is a condition of the central nervous system caused by infectious agents called prions, which kill cells in the brain as they accumulate and lead to neurological disease.
Prions, a type of protein, also accumulate in other tissues and may be shed by the infected animal into water or on plants and bedding through saliva, urine and feces.
It is 100 per cent fatal to wildlife with no known treatment.
However it is not known to affect humans or livestock, although public health guidance recommends that animals with CWD should not be consumed.
