Guthrie County Conservation Director Brad Halterman shared in the April 1st Guthrie County Board of Supervisors meeting that he’d been able to participate in an informative course.

Halterman says that the class was on Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD), an infectious and contagious disease that affects members of the deer family, like white-tail deer which are common in Iowa. He tells Raccoon Valley Radio some of what he was able to learn in the class.

“The course was just to learn more, scientifically speaking, about CWD and some of the studies that are out there and results and stuff that are out there. And then also learning how to properly take tests from that, to remove the lymph nodes from diseased deer and send them in to be tested so that they can get a bigger and better picture of what is out there in the deer herd.”

Halterman mentions that CWD has been found in Guthrie County before, but that it has been a few years since that confirmed case. He adds that with the rise in diseases in wildlife, he thought it prudent to learn more about this disease, so that he may be able to help identify it, and teach others about it. Halterman explains that the Guthrie County Conservation Department, in conjunction with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources and Guthrie County Public Health will be looking to put on an online seminar through Facebook live this summer to teach those interested about CWD.