Lice Disease

[Dslayer]

Yesterday, my son and I were hiking on logging roads near Cliffdell and saw a doe that had rubbed herself bare on both sides and her fawn who had lost a good deal of fur.  I'd seen some deer on the West side in the Cowlitz valley but this is the first I've seen on this side-never seen one in the Umptanum/Manastash where we do most of our hiking.  My son, who's 7 and very bright asked me some questions that I wasn't really sure how to answer-it's cool they survived the winter-but would it be better for the herd as a whole if deer that carried the louse died and lessened the chance of passing it on.  Along those lines, would it be better if deer that carried the louse were shot and eliminated from the herd?  Do any deer have the louse eventually become louse free and survive?

Just wondering-thanks!

[Dmanmastertracker]

 They do survive on the West -side for the most part, the East -side see's more mortality. The latest I've read is that the game department is seeing some sign's that our deer herd's as a whole are becoming a little adaptive to it, I don't know how, by putting on more weight, etc.., but there is some optimism that they can adapt.

[Dmanmastertracker]

  I would add, the deer generally don't get rid of the louse once they have it, DFW has looked at various ways to try to remove the louse from live deer and have been unsuccessful, it appears they have to just stick it out to survive it.

[Dslayer]

That's interesting.  We were wondering about adaptablity and all, my son is big guy on succession/survivability and all this stuff-a big dinosaur guy so he gets it.   Thanks.