Modifying CWD Management Zones as a result of the passage of SCR 24
The Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries Commission discussed changes to plan for handling Chronic Wasting Disease at their monthly meeting on Tuesday, June 2. They addressed modifying CWD Management Zones as a result of the passage of Senate Concurrent Resolution No. 24 (SCR 24), which was approved during the 2026 regular legislative session.
The LWFC voted to ratify a Declaration of Emergency that modifies regulations in four areas where deer with CWD, a fatal disease that affects many species of cervids, have been discovered.
The areas centered on and surrounding Tensas, Ouachita, Catahoula and Concordia parishes where deer infected with CWD have been found will be referred to as CWD Management Zones. The legislation passed this spring makes slight alterations to the size and scope of mitigation areas, especially with regards to baiting for whitetails in the affected areas.
Baiting regs
According to Johnathan Bordelon, Deer Program Manager for LDWF, most regulations that are special to the affected areas will remain the same, with a couple of changes. The acreage in a circle with a 5-mile radius around the place a CWD deer was discovered won’t change, but the mitigation areas around it will be cut in size – no longer including land between 15 and 25 miles from the CWD site. The mitigation zones will have roughly a 15-mile radius around the site, except for areas where natural geographic features and highways make for more easily recognized boundaries.
Baiting regulations in those areas will “start from scratch,” according to Bordelon. If deer surveys from July 1 to June 30 do not result in any more CWD-infected deer being found in the mitigation areas, baiting will be allowed in the buffer zones – 5 to 15 miles from the CWD site – beginning with the 2027-28 season, from Sept. 1 to March 31. The exception would be for wild-hog baiting and bear baiting by permit holders.
Bordelon said LDWF will be sampling deer throughout the year in the affected areas. The number of deer sampled in any one area will be capped at 300, with sampling ceilings varying in other areas according to the deer density and other factors.
If, Bordelon said, LDWF does not discover new CWD-infected deer in those areas greater than 2.5 percent of the number sampled, then baiting will be allowed in the mitigation buffer zones. If three consecutive sampling seasons pass without any new CWD discoveries, those zones can be removed from the CWD program.
Other actions
In other action, the LWFC passed a NOI to change regulations on how often unattended fishing gear – yo-yo lines, limb lines, trotlines – must be attended. The original proposal was to require commercial trotliners to check and change their baits every 36 hours, but after several sportsmen in attendance spoke out, the time was changed to 48 hours.
More action taken at the meeting was to make permanent regulations regarding the size of gear that licensed bait dealers can use in obtaining bait for sale. The regulations have been temporary and extended for several years, but with a “sunset” clause to take effect at the end of 2026, the regs were made permanent.
