Sick deer

[Coues79]

I was out bowhunting today and came across a doe that was acting pretty weird. She was hanging around a game water catchment and had no concerns or worries about humans being around. I was on my quad and came up to the catchment to see her slowly walking off. She was by herself.

 

Coming down from a hill a couple hundred yards away, there were 3 other deer coming to water. They were in no way connected to the same herd. This small group had a buck in it and we put on a hunt, rather waited til' he came in to water. To make it short, we missed and off they went.

 

After the shot, we spent probably 15-20 minutes looking for the arrow and on my way back to the quad, 30 yards away from where we were scouring the place trying to find the arrow, I jumped the doe. She kind of stotted off a few yards and that's when I picked up my glasses and looked at her. When I saw her, she had some serious foam and drool coming out of her mouth. I mean bad.

 

I sat there and watched her slowly make her way over a small rise and I decided to go walk over to where I last saw her and see if I could see her again. When I got to the place she topped over, I found her again, bedded down 30 yards from me. She had no care at all that I was there, (I even hollered at my ol' man to come up there and check her out.) He came up and she then got up and moved off a couple hundred yards and watched her bed down again, still foaming at the mouth and drooling something terrible.

 

It was just a weird situation and it was obvious this doe was sick. She didn't appear to be skinny and frail, but her drooling and lack of concern about humans kinda made me wonder. I was hoping someone on the site may have an idea of what it could have been, if I should contact anyone about it or just forget about it. I have never seen a deer acting this way and some of these symptoms kinda overlap with CWD. She is hangin' real close to that game water, so if its an illness that is contagious, it wouldn't be a good deal.

 

If you have any info. let me know.

 

Thanks

[az4life]

Sounds like a bad thing. I bet Amanda and others will have some good ideas for you. Without their input I'd probably get in touch with AGFD to see what they have to say. No CWD known in the state as of yet, so it's likely something else.

If you call them, Let us know what GFD says.

[azryan]

Sounds like a bad thing. I bet Amanda and others will have some good ideas for you. Without their input I'd probably get in touch with AGFD to see what they have to say. No CWD known in the state as of yet, so it's likely something else.

If you call them, Let us know what GFD says.

 

 

I would call then AZGFD, Hearing that made me a little worried.

 

Hopefully its nothing then just a common sickness

 

Was it close to a bordering state by any chance?

[Coues79]

As the crow flies it was about 30 miles from the New Mexico line. I think I might give the game and fish a call tomorrow to see what they have to say.

[NRS]

The drooling and foaming at the mouth is symptomatic of rabies. If you were in the southeast part of the state, there is always a fairly high incidence of rabies, usually in skunks and foxes, so the deer could have been picked it up from something in the area. I would definitely let G&F know!!

[CouesWhitetail]

I would agree that rabies is a possibility. Rabies can affect any mammal. Call AGFD and inform them about what you saw. There are also some other diseases that cause drooling and foaming of the mouth in deer, like bluetongue and adenovirus hemorrhagic disease.

http://www.dfw.state.or.us/wildlife/diseases/andevirus/

 

I will email Jim H. and ask him to weigh in on this. He may know more about what it's most likely to be.

 

Amanda

[firstcoueswas80]

Hey what do you know, I was thinking rabies also. looks like we have a bunch of smart folks here

[Coues79]

I too had been thinking about rabies. I know that some of the symptoms she was showing are symptoms of rabies as well. From what I understand, rabies is highly contagious, but I am unsure of if it could be transmitted via watering out of a game water catchment? It would have to be done through saliva. Can it be done this way or does something have to get tagged by a critter with rabies itself?

 

Anyways, I called the G&F just now and told them what I saw and gave them my name and phone number. The lady told me that they would be in contact with the warden in the unit to let him know what I saw. I really hope that they take it serious, finds the doe and figures out what is wrong with her.

 

With the deer population down the way that it is, if it was possibly something that was contagious, it could do damage quick.

 

BTW, I read a little in Heffelfingers book on diseases and I'm not quite sure what it could be. There are bovine living in the same areas so I wonder if it could be something transmitted from them?

 

Anyways, if anything progresses and I hear back from them, I'll post what I hear. Thanks for the input.

[ac guy]

It really sucks that you can't shoot sick or wounded deer in this state. What if that deer had a contagious disease.

[deernut]

CochranJ-

 

Rabies is possible but unlikely. The fact that we have CWD at White Sands Missle Base in SW NM is a concern, but we have not found CWD in AZ despite some aggressive sampling. Just about any disease will result in the deer not being scared of humans and drooling so there is not much to diagnose from the keyboard.

 

I will e-mail the WMs over there (not sure if it was 28 or 29 from your message) and make sure they followup. Hopefully you gave them the catchment number or a Lat/Long. I would like them to shoot it and bring it in if they can. I'm headed out of town for a meeting until Sunday night so I won't be around to followup but I'll do what I can to get someone to check it out.

 

JIM