CWD Confirmed in a Wild Deer Near Stillwater, Minnesota

Minnesota has a new chronic wasting disease detection, this time in a wild deer near Stillwater.

The Minnesota DNR says a landowner reported a female deer that had been hanging around for several days, acting unafraid of people and looking emaciated. The deer died July 16, DNR staff recovered it, and testing through the University of Minnesota’s Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory confirmed CWD.

The detection is in deer permit area 236, about 30 miles from the nearest confirmed CWD cases in both Minnesota and western Wisconsin. That distance matters. A new wild-deer detection can change surveillance, carcass movement concerns, and how hunters in the area need to think about testing and disposal.

This is why reporting sick deer matters. Hunters and landowners are often the first people to notice something is wrong on the landscape. If a deer is acting tame, wasting away, drooling, stumbling, or just looks wrong, do not shrug it off. Call it in and let the biologists do their job.

CWD is not solved by panic, and it is not solved by denial. It is handled by surveillance, testing, sound deer management, and hunters who stay engaged instead of checking out.