Deer Scent Maker Responds to VDGIF Ban on Deer Urine Products

Earlier this month, the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries banned the use of products made from bodily fluids of deer for hunting.  This includes estrus scent lures like Code Blue and even a product made here in Virginia by Reaper Scents.  DGIF claims these products increase the likelihood of the spread of Chronic wasting disease (CWD) .  But as Steve Lovern of Reaper Scents told the Roanoke Times, as quoted by Grand View Outdoors, there have only been a relative handful of CWD cases in Virginia and the disease is not spread by the use of these scents:

... the ban is unenforceable and based on bad science. Deer pick up CWD from supplemental feeding, not licking each other’s urine, he told the paper.

“As they eat, saliva drips from their mouth and another deer eats that saliva. This is how CWD is transmitted,” Lovern said.

There are over 250,000 hunters in Virginia, many of which hunt on private property.  Most would agree that DGIF has more important things to spend scarce fiscal resources on than enforcing a ban of this type that has little scientific evidence to back it up.