Swamp Wolf, there has been exactly 1 deer test positive for CWD in the county we hunt in the last 6 years. Due to state laws, we cant bait because it was also detected within 10 miles of our county boundary more recently. There isn't any ag land around us, mature maple stands and swamp. Some deer but not nearly the concentration of other parts of the state. We're not all expert hunters like you, we enjoy a permanent stand in a likely spot and used to enjoy seeing deer and other wildlife every year until about 6 years ago when we had to stop baiting because we follow the rules unlike a lot of hunters around us. We never killed a bunch of mature bucks, but we put meat in the freezer and made some great memories.

Would you keep on going to deer camp if you didnt see a deer year after year? The guys that came to our camp found other places to hunt that have higher deer populations. Our populations aren't wiped out because of CWD but our hunting success sure has changed due to state laws surrounding it.

I hope for your sake it doesn't become as prevalent in Georgia as it has in Wisconsin. Those little deer you got down there probably die from a bad case of crotch itch, CWD would knock em all out.

Expert hunter? Me? Lol

I still don't quite understand your situation tlguy.

You had a deer camp and killed plenty of deer when you could hunt over bait but after baiting was illegal there were no deer killed.

Baiting had that much of an influence? Where did the deer go? Please dont say they all went to the neighbor that illegally baits. That simply is not true. A travelling rutting buck proves that wrong.

Was it only 100 acres with 6 guys as yotetrapper30 describes? If so, the bait wasn't your issue...it was land availability & access.

There is very little agriculture here where most of my deer hunting takes place. Hunting over bait has been legal since 2008 (if I remember correctly.) Prior to that everyone around me baited except me (because I was the game warden.) How do I know that? Because I charged their butts regularly, but they kept doing it because the fines set by the county were so low. But, guess what....I still killed plenty of deer in those pre-legal-baiting years.

Dont hate on my smaller southern deer. It took them 1000s of years to adapt to these poor sandy soils and survive. They survive infected sand gnat bites carrying EHD better than them northern whitetails do.

Not because the disease, because the rules changed. We used to get 1 buck tag and had to pay 2 dollars to get a chance to get picked by auction for a doe tag. Cwd arrived and they thought killing all the deer was the answer so they gave out 3 tags for bow and 3 tags for gun. People decided to listen and fill all their tags if they could and the population declined severely in many zones. Here we are today and see that cwd, while is real, has had no real affect on the animals or the people.

Swamp, we also have a big difference in landscape for deer in wi. Southern wi doesn't have real harsh winters and the deer to pretty well. Central WI is huge ag land and the deer thrive because the crops. Northern wi is big woods. A lot less deer. A lot less food for the deer and wolves that kill deer too. A hunters experience will be different depending on which part of the state they hunt. Northern wi hunters really benefitted from using bait as those deer are not as pattern able as they don't have the ag fields to keep them tight. They cover lots of ground instead. Cwd isn't the issue. It's other factors that hurt the deer population. Cwd was the catalyst.

Mr. Swamp, appreciate your perspective on this.

What have y’all seen from a mineral perspective? I’d make an assumption that my mineral sites get more deer saliva than a baiting site (illegal in VA during hunting season).