Chronic Wasting Disease Detected for First Time in Yellowstone National Park
Chronic Wasting Disease has officially reached Yellowstone National Park. The first confirmed case in a mule deer underscores the growing challenge facing wildlife managers as a fatal disease continues to spread through deer, elk, and moose populations across the American West.
This was never a question of if CWD would reach Yellowstone—it was a question of when. The real concern isn't a single mule deer; it's what happens when a disease that cannot be eradicated takes hold in one of North America's most important wildlife landscapes. Yellowstone has long been viewed as a benchmark for ecological health, and this detection serves as a reminder that even our most protected places are not insulated from biological threats. Healthy habitat still matters, but CWD is teaching us that disease may prove every bit as consequential to wildlife as drought, predators, or wildfire.
NOTE: this article was originally published to JHNewsandGuide.com on November 14, 2023. It was written by Billy Arnold.
Chronic wasting disease, an always-fatal neurological condition that has been spreading through western Wyoming deer, elk and moose, has been detected for the first time in Yellowstone National Park.
The Wyoming Game and Fish Department confirmed the disease in an adult mule deer buck found near Yellowstone Lake, the park announced Tuesday.
There is “no effective strategy” to eradicate chronic wasting disease once detected in wildlife, and Yellowstone will now have to determine how to manage it. To do so, the Park Service plans to increase collaboration and information sharing with Game and Fish to identify areas in Yellowstone where there is increased risk for CWD. In addition, monitoring will increase for the presence of CWD in deer, elk and moose along with more investigations of ungulate carcasses and collecting more samples for testing.
The park is revisiting its 2021 Chronic Wasting Disease Surveillance Plan in the wake of the detection and intends to complete the plan in 2024.
The infected mule deer was originally captured by Game and Fish near Cody for a population dynamics study and fitted with a GPS collar. The collar let wildlife managers know the animal had died in mid-October in Yellowstone. Game and Fish staff then found the carcass on the Promontory, a landmass that separates the south and southeast arms of Yellowstone Lake.
Samples tested positive in multiple diagnostic tests performed at the state Wildlife Health Laboratory.