- I do a radio program on the outdoors most Friday or Saturday
mornings from 8:30 to 9:00, on Stockton Radio, 107.7 f.m. It isn't a real
sophisticated program, but it covers a pretty good area in a circle from
Joplin over to Springfield and up to Lebanon, Lake of the Ozarks, back
over to Nevada. We have a good time talking about hunting and fishing and
nature and conservation, and folks call in with their comments and questions.
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- A couple of weeks ago a gentleman from Greenfield, Mo.
called in, and identified himself as Faren Fite. I thought for a moment
it was some kind of hoax call, because he said he had seen around 200 owls
the day before in one small area between Greenfield and Lockwood. He said
that on one corral fence there were more than thirty in a group!
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- When you are a grizzled old outdoor veteran like me,
you figure you have seen about everything in the outdoors, and I have never
seen more than four or five owls of any species together in the woods ever.
So, figuring if I haven't ever seen something, I won't believe it, I sort
of dismissed it, until Mr. Fite sent me the photos he had taken. And folks,
'I ain't never seen nothin' like it'. If you are a computer type of person
you can go to the website that a Sondra Gray maintains for me, www.larrydablemontoutdoors.blogspot.com,
and you can see many of Mr. Faren Fites phascinating and fenomenal fotos.
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- There was one photo of 28 owls sitting on a small corral
fence, as if they were attending a family reunion. Maybe it was an owl
convention of some kind. I don't doubt Mr. Fite at all now. He says along
that rural road, there were 200 owls at least, and I wish I could have
seen it.
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- It was a huge group of short-eared owls, a species a
little bit like the barred owl in size and appearance. But in habit, they
are much different than most of the owls we are accustomed to hearing and
seeing in the Ozarks. They have a mean look to them, with ornery-looking
bright yellow eyes rather than the brown eyes the barred owl has. And the
face is much different, with a pronounced circle of feathers, contrasting
white and dark brown, and two little feather patches referred to as "ears",
which are much like the horns on a horned owl. Except the ears on a short-eared
owl can usually not be seen, they just barely stick up above the forehead
most of the time.
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- They are a species not so much fond of forests; they
stick to a more open country like that prairie land along the Missouri
Kansas border, with scrub timber and thickets. And they nest on the ground!
Now that is something, when you think about how most all owls nest in hollow
trees. The barn owl often nests in old buildings of course, and there is
an odd little burrowing owl which nests in holes in the ground.
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- It is interesting to note that an owl can't build a nest
because his beak isn't made for carrying and assembling nest materials.
A burrowing owl doesn't dig his burrow, and barn owls don't build a nest
at all, they just lay eggs on a barn loft or ledge. Great horned owls and
barred owls find a natural hole in a tree and nest there, or sometime use
an old hawk nest. But short-eared owls actually nest in the grass on the
ground, which they trample down and flatten down, and they actually try
to arrange a few sticks in a situation which really doesn't resemble a
nest. Knowing that other owls do not carry sticks, that's something I'd
like to see.
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- On this little flattened grass "nest" they
will lay anywhere from 3 or 4 to 7 or 8 eggs, depending on the whim of
the female owl I suppose. They lay their eggs in May or early June, and
the eggs aren't much more than an inch wide, about an inch and half long.
That is a very small egg for a bird that eventually will mature at a size
of 14 to 16 inches in length and weigh about a pound.
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- Ornithologists examined the stomach contents of 110 short-eared
owls many years back, and found that three-quarters of their diet had been
mice of one kind or another, about 10 percent small birds and nearly as
many moles and shrews. About 7 percent of the diet appeared to be insects,
with the stomach of one owl containing about 30 big grasshoppers. Another
odd thing about the short-eared owl is that he is a daytime type of owl,
actively hunting during the day more than at night, when most other owls
are active.
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- Mr. Fites pictures are fascinating, and leave you to
wonder why so many owls would be concentrated in such a small area together.
Who can explain that? Certainly not me, and up to this week I though I
knew everything! Obviously it is some kind of a migration, perhaps not
very far, but likely from a place where food supplies of small ground mammals
had been decimated for some reason or another. It is likely a mass movement
of a species looking for food. I don't see, anywhere in books I have, any
naturalists talking about a migration of owls.
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- Obviously, as I have said so often, no one can know all
there is to know about nature. Those of us who spend a great deal of time
outdoors see unexplainable things. A modern day outdoorsman or naturalist
who tries to learn by the book can know little of the secrets of nature.
You have to be there sometimes to see things which perhaps no one has seen
before. I am much interested in hearing if any of my readers has ever seen
anything like this before.
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- Finally, mad-deer disease, or Chronic Wasting Disease,
has come to Missouri, right where I predicted it would first be found,
in one of those deer pens where they try to raise giant antlers by feeding
an herbivorous creature a diet that includes meat by-products.
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- The first deer with Chronic Wasting Disease was found
on such a place in north Missouri. I will write more about this later.
Rest assured, it is the first, but not at all the last. Missouri's wild
deer will not escape it, as it is widespread in southern Wisconsin and
northern Illinois.
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- Come to our big 'Grizzled Old Outdoorsman's Swap-meet
Event' at Nixa this coming Saturday, March 6. Doors will open to the public
at 9:00 and it will last most of the day. Uncle Norten and I are looking
forward to meeting with readers of this column. He's bringing his hand-made
sassafras canoe paddles and I am bringing my hand-made turkey calls. And
there will be many tables filled with bargains of all kinds, antiques,
hunting and fishing gear, beautiful outdoor art, you name it. You can reserve
your own table if you have outdoor or country-living treasures to sell.
There are still plenty available.
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- Call the Nixa Community Center, phone 417-725-5468. The
swap meet will be held there in a big gymnasium, at 701 N. Taylor Way.
You may also call Sondra Gray with Lightnin' Ridge Publishing, 417-234-9104
for information or to reserve a table. You can get directions and information
on that website of mine, given above.
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- My address is Box 22, Bolivar, Mo. 65613. E-mail me at
lightninridge@windstream.net. http://www.lakeexpo.com/articles/2010/03/02/top_news/04.txt
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- CWD Comes to Missouri
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- CHRONIC WASTING DISEASE, CERVID - USA
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- Date: Thu 25 Feb 2010 Missouri Department of Agriculture
[edited] http://mda.mo.gov/news/2010/Chronic_Wasting_Disease_Found_in_Captive_Deer
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- The Missouri Departments of Agriculture [MDA], Conservation
[MDC], and Health and Senior Services [DHSS], and the US Department of
Agriculture [USDA] announced today [25 Feb 2010] that a captive white-tailed
deer in Linn County, Missouri has tested positive for chronic wasting disease
(CWD). CWD is a neurological disease found in deer, elk and moose.
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- "There is no evidence that CWD poses a risk to domestic
animals or humans," said State Veterinarian Dr Taylor Woods. "We
have protocols in place to quickly and effectively handle these situations."
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- The animal that tested positive for CWD was a white-tailed
deer inspected as part of the State's CWD surveillance and testing program.
Preliminary tests were conducted by the USDA National Veterinary Services
Laboratory in Ames, Iowa.
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- Upon receiving the confirmed CWD positive, Missouri's
departments of Agriculture, Conservation and Health and Senior Services
initiated their CWD Contingency Plan. The plan was developed in 2002 by
the Cervid Health Committee, a task force comprised of veterinarians, animal
health officers, and conservation officers from USDA, MDA, MDC, and DHSS
working together to mitigate challenges associated with CWD.
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- CWD is transmitted by live animal to animal contact or
soil to animal contact. The disease was first recognized in 1967 in captive
mule deer in the Colorado Division of Wildlife captive wildlife research
facility in Fort Collins, Colorado. CWD has been documented in deer and/or
elk in Colorado, Illinois, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska,
New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia,
Wisconsin, and the Canadian Provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan. There
has been no evidence that the disease can be transmitted to humans.
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- "Missouri's proactive steps to put a testing protocol
in place and create a contingency plan years ago is proving beneficial.
We are in a solid position to follow pre-established steps to ensure Missouri's
valuable whitetail deer resource remains healthy and strong," said
Jason Sumners Missouri's Deer Biologist.
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- For more information regarding CWD, please contact Dr
Taylor Woods at (573) 751-3377.
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- -- Communicated by: ProMED-mail Rapporteur Brent Barrett
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- This is the 1st case of CWD in Missouri. Kansas and Oklahoma
already have CWD cases in captive cervids.
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- While it is unfortunate for the cervid owner, one wonders
how long the deer had been on the premises and if this was a Missouri grown
deer or one that had been brought from elsewhere. It highlights the need
for accurate record keeping. Hopefully the herd owner will have records
regarding the deer. Most cervid owners in various states are required to
keep records of inventory, which animals are born on the premises, which
are bought or sold, and the individual the animal was purchased or sold
to. Those kinds of accurate records will assist the state in their possible
understanding of how the disease came to be in their state. - Mod.TG
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- The Midwestern state of Missouri can be located on the
HealthMap/ProMED-mail interactive map at http://healthmap.org/r/018U Linn
County can be located on the map at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linn_County,_Missouri.
- Sr.Tech.Ed.MJ]
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- Patricia A. Doyle DVM, PhD Bus Admin, Tropical Agricultural
Economics Univ of West Indies Please visit my "Emerging Diseases"
message board at: http://www.emergingdisease.org/phpbb/index.php Also my
new website: http://drpdoyle.tripod.com/ Zhan le Devlesa tai sastimasa
Go with God and in Good Health
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