Hunters who snag a deer near Ogden during next year’s general season hunt will be required to have the animal tested for chronic wasting disease, following an increase in cases detected in the region.
Over 350 deer and 10 elk have tested positive for the disease in Utah since it was first found in a buck harvested near Vernal that tested positive in 2002. Nearly 100 of the 2,460 deer and elk sampled over the past two years tested positive, including multiple cases in the Ogden and East Canyon units, and parts of central, northeast and southeast Utah, according to Ginger Stout, state wildlife veterinarian for the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources.
That includes an elk in the Ogden unit that had no other nearby deer detections, which she said is “abnormal” for how the disease spreads and sparked the desire to learn more about disease spread. The unit includes the Ogden Valley area, as well as other wilderness terrain in the region. It’s located just north of the East Canyon unit, where she said cases “seem to be exponentially increasing.”
“There are hot spots in the state, but it does seem to be spreading out from those hot spots,” she said in a video that the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources uploaded about its decision.
Some required sampling already existed in some of the recently affected areas, but that hadn’t been the case for the Ogden area. The division has stations where hunters can have the animal they’ve collected voluntarily tested for chronic wasting disease, but it also has the authority to determine areas when and where chronic wasting disease testing is mandatory without going through the same public process as other rule changes.
Those participating in the general-season, any-legal-weapon buck deer hunt within the Ogden unit — set for Oct. 17-25, 2026 — must submit the lymph nodes of any harvested deer for testing. The division will mail kits that have instructions on how to take samples and send them to the division for testing.
It will be a “trial year,” and more mandatory testing will likely be implemented in the area in future years for data purposes, Stout said.
“These additional samples will help us better track the prevalence of this disease and its spread in Utah,” she said.
Chronic wasting disease is caused by an infectious protein that often accumulates in the brains and spinal cords of deer, elk and moose, similar to mad cow disease in cattle and scrapie in sheep. It causes the animal to develop brain lesions that ultimately become fatal because there is no treatment or cure, and is spread through urine, feces and saliva, and causes some deer to develop symptoms like droopy ears, excessive salivation or listlessness.
The Centers for Disease Control says there’s no “strong evidence” to date that the disease infects humans, but it may still pose a risk, which is why it recommends that people do not consume infected deer.
State wildlife officials also recommend that hunters avoid harvesting animals that appear sick. That said, many times an infected deer may not show symptoms because it usually takes 18 to 24 months for the disease to appear.
State officials, Stout said, also monitor the disease closely because it can also cause population declines, building on the stresses like drought and habitat loss that have dropped statewide deer population estimates well below the state’s goal of more than 400,000 deer.
That’s where testing comes into play. She said officials say they hope to gain at least 300 samples from the Ogden unit next year that will go toward better understanding the disease’s spread north.
“This will be the start,” she said. “We’ll assess how this works in the future.”