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1. Game and Fish to Hold Meeting on Brucellosis Plan [WY]
Big Horn Radio Network
August 17, 2015
The Wyoming Game & Fish Department will host a public meeting at 6:00 p.m. on Aug. 25 in the basement of Big Horn Federal Bank in Cody to review the Clarks Fork elk herd brucellosis management action plan (BMAP). The Clarks Fork elk herd unit contains hunt areas 51, 53, and 54.
"The Clark's Fork BMAP outlines strategies for minimizing the risk of brucellosis transmission from elk to elk and from elk to cattle," said Wildlife Management Coordinator Tim Woolley. "Attending the meeting will provide an opportunity to learn what steps Game and Fish is taking on strategies to reduce elk-elk and elk-cattle transmission of the disease and provide input on the draft plan for this elk herd."
The development of the BMAP's was one of the top recommendations of the Wyoming Governor's Brucellosis Coordination Team, a panel of cattle producers, scientists, wildlife professionals, veterinarians, and lawmakers. This group was assembled in 2004 to make recommendations related to brucellosis in wildlife and livestock, and to reclaim and retain class-free brucellosis status for Wyoming's cattle.
Representatives from the Wyoming Livestock Board and/or USDA-APHIS-Veterinary Services will be present to provide input on the management options, discuss the brucellosis Designated Surveillance Area, (DSA) and answer any technical questions that may arise.
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2. Animal rights groups challenging Ann Arbor deer cull ahead of council vote tonight [MI]
By Ryan Stanton
MLive.com
August 17, 2015
A Southfield-based group called Michigan's Political Action Committee for Animals is opposing culling deer in Ann Arbor.
In a letter to the City Council on Monday, the animal welfare advocacy organization indicated its attorneys, along with the Humane Society of Huron Valley and at least one other local group, are looking into challenging the legality of a cull based on animal cruelty laws and the state's 450-foot safety zone rule.
Mi-PACA argues there's no scientific evidence of ecological imbalance or great public health dangers to support culling in Ann Arbor, accusing council members of "pandering to the small but vocal and well-off group of citizens who want remedy for landscape concerns."
If a cull is carried out, the group is asking that it be videotaped and the video made available so there's transparency and accountability.
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3. Experts: Deer wasting disease not widespread [TX - edited]
By Enrique Rangel
Amarillo Globe-News
August 16, 2015
SAN ANTONIO - The recent euthanization of about three dozen deer in a South Texas ranch, where three bucks were found with a degenerative neurological disorder called chronic wasting disease, has raised concerns about the well-being of the $2.1 billion-a-year deer industry in Texas.
"Should you be concerned about chronic wasting disease? Yes, but don't panic," Walter Cook, clinical associate professor at Texas A&M University, told a large gathering at the annual state convention of the Texas Deer Association that ended on Saturday.
"All the evidence out there suggests that humans are not susceptible to chronic wasting disease," Cook said. "And we clearly know that people have been eating deer and elk that have chronic wasting disease for decades."
"This is not an outbreak, this is not an epidemic," said. Dee Ellis, executive director of the Texas Animal Health Commission. "Until six weeks ago, we didn't have CWD in Texas."
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4. Bird flu aftershocks: Limited supplies to drive U.S. turkey, egg prices higher
By Reuters Media
West Central Tribune
August 16, 2015
Limited supplies of baby poultry and barn space to house them will hamper U.S. farmers' efforts to rebuild ravaged egg supplies after the nation's worst-ever outbreak of bird flu.
As a result of the shortages and the loss of more than 48 million chickens and turkeys to the disease, egg prices will climb higher than previously expected this year and remain high through 2016, according to estimates from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Frozen wholesale turkey prices are expected to be up to 19 percent higher for the key Thanksgiving holiday than they were a year ago.
Chicken and turkey producers say the egg and poultry industry faces up to two years of rebuilding to fully replace flocks.
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5. High beef prices fueling rustling revival in Plains states
Michael Graczyk, Associated Press
WPTV.com
August 16, 2015
GIDDINGS, Texas (AP) -- Doug Hutchison wears a badge and carries a gun but his most effective weapon in the pursuit of livestock thieves in the nation's largest cattle-producing territory may be his smartphone.
With it, Hutchison, one of 30 Special Rangers with the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association, photographs suspected stolen livestock, accesses the association's databases of livestock brands and reports of missing animals and consults with sheriff's offices.
"I think it's one of the greatest tools in the world," said Hutchison, wearing a cowboy hat and jeans, his boots mired in the mud and manure of noisy auction stockyard corrals filled with nervous cattle.
Cattle prices have been at record levels, and reports of missing or stolen cattle have followed. The nearly 5,800 livestock reported as such in Texas in 2014 was the most in five years, and the value of the animals - in excess of $5.7 million - the most in a decade.
"Any time you see the price of any commodity go up, you see the theft of that commodity rise," says Larry Gray, executive director of law enforcement for the association founded in 1877.
There were nearly 90 million head of cattle and calves in the U.S. at the beginning of 2015, the fewest in some six decades. Texas, where drought forced ranchers to trim herds, had just under 12 million, nearly double the next largest beef-producing states of Nebraska and Kansas.
The Special Rangers cover 76 million acres in Texas and Oklahoma. Through July this year, they've worked nearly 400 theft cases; they did nearly 800 in 2014. In one case last month, a Texas man was charged with theft after 544 steers worth nearly $800,000 went missing. The Kansas Attorney General's Office has 20 open investigations.
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6. Study: Badger persecution does not reduce bovine TB risk [UK]
By Bovine Veterinarian news source
Bovine Veterinarian
August 17, 2015
The debate over the role of badgers in spreading bovine tuberculosis (bTB), and what to do about it, continues to rage in the UK.
Meanwhile, others have taken matters into their own hands and attempted to deal with the perceived badger threat themselves, but a new study has found low-level persecution does not help and may actually make the situation worse.
Bovine Tuberculosis or bTB has proven difficult to control and eradicate in cattle, costing the UK Government more than �100m per annum in testing, slaughter and compensation.
Although badgers are an acknowledged contributor to the persistence and spread of bTB in British and Irish cattle, culling trials in the UK and Ireland have failed to show definitive benefits.
In England, the randomised badger culling trial or RBCT showed that, while intensive pro-active culling was associated with a decrease in cattle bTB inside cull areas, it also prompted an increase in bTB in neighbouring herds.
The proposed reason is the so-called 'perturbation' effect, i.e. a disruption in the social structure of the badger population that results in increased spread of bTB to cattle from infected badgers.
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