Wildlife officials say at least six deer killed near Elkader in northeastern Iowa have now tested positive for chronic wasting disease, upping the number of Iowa counties where wild deer have tested positive to eight.
The Iowa Department of Natural Resources submitted nearly 7,000 deer tissue samples for testing from hunter-killed or road-killed deer in the recent hunting season. Testing showed 43 positive results, six of which were near Elkader in Clayton County.
“While the number of positives this year jumps out, it’s not out of the realm of what we would expect,” Tyler Harms, wildlife biologist with the Iowa DNR said in a news release on the Iowa DNR website.
The Telegraph Herald reports that the Iowa Department of Natural Resources announced the development Tuesday. The department said the disease was discovered for the first time in Decatur, Fayette, Winneshiek and Woodbury counties during the recent season.
The DNR says hunters who harvest a deer in a county known to have chronic wasting disease should be careful to leave the carcass on the land to prevent spreading the disease.