In the Deep South, EHD is so endemic (occurs every year) that many deer have developed an immunity to the disease, and yes, that immunity can be passed from mother doe to her fawns.
Worst die-off I've ever seen in TN was the 2007 outbreak. I was assisting the TWRA with their thermal imaging surveys at the time, and we were doing Williamson County. At night, you could tell how close we were getting to a creek or pond by the gagging stench of dead deer. The next year, in eastern Williamson County, we couldn't buy a deer sighting using thermal imaging. I suspect that area experienced a 70-80% die-off. Over in western Middle TN, centered on Hickman County, I suspect most herds experienced a 30-50% die-off.
We had a severe die off in 2007 at our place in Hickman County. 2019 had to be very hit and miss heard reports saw nothing around us. An interesting theory thrown out there for this year was the severe freeze we had in December and seeing how it may affect the midges. Will be interesting with how random the drought is becoming around the states as well.
Lewis Co. had one as well one reason as well as others for not renewing our lease we had there .
In some parts of the state, that's a good thing, especially parts of western TN. In 2006, I was really starting to ring the over-population bell pretty hard. Then we had the die-off in 2007. No more over-population problem.
True dat!Never will have to ring that bell here in north east tn
. I do remember seeing a nice 8pt in August while on the 4-wheeler at about 30 yards…he just kind of looked at me and dropped his head down and kept walking. Knew that was abnormal.Nature gets around to trying everything. There is never "balance" in the short run, but always balance in the long run.
On my place in 2007, the deer were in such bad shape some of the bucks couldn't finish mineralizing their antlers (turning them to bone). The ends of each tine and beam were black (even after the velvet fell off), and you could dig your fingernails into the black sections of antler. Most of those black tips crumbled and fell off when we cleaned the skulls.Never heard of ehd until 2007 when everyone started talking about it. That was the first year we planted corn and needless to say, it didn't do well because of the drought. I also had just graduated college and had tons of time to hunt that fall due to not landing a job yet. That fall I learned the significance of ehd. I don't know how many times I went hunting and didn't see a deer…like 10-12 sits with seeing a deer
Because of the heat and the unrelenting drought, I expected to see a big EHD outbreak in 2022. But it didn't happen. I suppose we were too close to the 2019 outbreak. Most of the deer still had immunity from 2019. But we experienced the same lack of seasonal shifting. The bucks just never showed up. However, I later discovered that there were pockets of acorn-producing oaks in wetlands. All of the deer were packed into those small areas. Anyone that had that situation on their land absolutely cleaned-up on big bucks.
Makes perfect sense on the immunity from 2019.
Last year was the worst drought and acorn crop I've experienced in 35 years on my place. Zero acorns. Unfortunately, close by are some big swamps that hold Swamp White Oaks and Swamp Chestnut Oaks. They were carrying and ALL of the deer were packed into those areas, off my property.
We didn't even have a single hickory nut, much less an acorn. Squirrels were cutting pine cones in Sept & completely moved off of us by Dec. Have one hollow that has an old home place in it with 10-12 walnut trees. First time in 21 years that none of them bared.
We had the same situation. No acorns, no nuts, blackberries failed, no persimmons, no Muscadine grapes. Nothing. And to make matters worse, our food plots completely failed. Worst deer season we've ever had, and the deer we did have on the place were in the worst shape I've ever seen. I'm really worried about what shape they'll be in this year. They couldn't have made it through winter in good shape.
