oh deer
I have come across fawns sleeping in my yard while doing yardwork early in the day. Certainly within a few feet before noticing each other.
This still doesn’t seem to explain it. Deer are like 15-20% of the human population in the midwest so “herds of 40” outdoors are roughly equivalent to an outdoor human crowd of 200-250 people, something which we saw daily for example last summer, and still didn’t result in nearly 40% seroprevalence. Outdoor transmission in humans is just rare.
The question isn’t whether deer can transmit easily, it’s a question of how they managed to transmit at apparently higher rates than humans given what we know. Even more odd, the NPR article says that seroprevalence in deer was already 30% in Iowa by December 2020. That is crazy to me and presumably why the spread in deer is described as “explosive.”
I agree, because I wasn’t trying to explain it. ,
I’ve no idea why the deer have high levels of covid.
And yet, no hospitalizations!! Must be a hoax!!
I suspect the coyotes help the deer avoid hospitalization…
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must have high vax rates, so all these are breakthrough cases but fortunately, no serious cases
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Now I’m wondering about Coyote COVID or CoyoVID.
And of course, now we see articles where health officials are encouraging deer hunters to wear masks when field dressing a deer.
Well, not until you get to within 6 feet or so, right? Maybe those knife-hunting freaks need them, but not someone shooting a non-threatening animal from 60 feet or so.
Also, are these deer dying of COVID? (Or with COVID? /s) No evidence of mass deaths, so maybe deer have something going for them? Unless they’re sneezing a lot, exposing them to the ears of natural predators. So many inane questions, so few answers…
Yeah, that’s odd. You don’t get within 6 feet of a deer unless they’ve stopped breathing for the most part. You’re certainly not field dressing them while there’s still life in them.
But can you catch Covid from a dead body? Like if Covid deer blood/guts splattered near your mouth or eyes would that put you at risk?
I honestly have no idea. But if infected dead bodies do pose a risk, I would think that eye protection would be at least as important as a face mask.
I would think that by now we must have some idea of what risk dead Covid human bodies pose to morgue / funeral home / crematorium workers, and I’d think it would be the same risk for a dead Covid deer as a dead Covid human.
The mortuary folks probably do a lot less chopping up than hunters do 
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There are a lot of diseases you can catch from a dead wild animal. I’ve been taught for years that you should wear gloves when handling them. Face masks seem odd, though, since they’ve generally stopped breathing before you get close.
Yeah, I think the mask would be more useful for splatters than exhalations.
That’s why surgeons wear them.
And yet, they wear a lot more protection than most hunters do when field dressing their kill.
As Lucy mentioned above, health departments/sanitation departments/colleges have been testing sewage waste for the presence of COVID to determine prevalence. That should prove that it is in human waste and probably deer waste as well so contact with that could put you at risk. But I agree, I would think that eye protection would be just as important as masking up.
I wonder if the people who put out the advice are experience hunters and really thought through their advice? Or whether they did what a lot of other medical professionals and politicians have done and just knee jerk reacted “Masks, Masks, Masks, they will save us all!!!”
Yeah, I’ve seen the odd hunter use gloves, but most don’t. But based on this thread, I’ll be using gloves going forward.
If you’re getting into deer waste, something’s gone wrong. Though upon reflection, there’s enough work done in the general area that your point is valid. Wear gloves.
Don’t look in my back yard…