Archived News from your past President
September 2005
Message From WCDEFA President Joel Espe
Like many of you, I've been up to my elbows in work lately. Robbie Marr and his sister Dawn were gracious enough to introduce me to the use of the shoulder length glove in AIing elk. Dawn demonstrated and then talked me through inserting and removing CIDR's. I believe one of the pictures Robbie took of me will be Christmas card material. Their open house at Wildlife Acres near Mineral Point will be September 17th and 18th. Last year they AIed 300 head of elk; their herd currently is around 800.
Speaking of open houses, the Arvold Brothers at Elk Rock Ranch near Exeland are also having theirs the 17th also. I rode with Richard Spanton from his Golden Bear Monarch elk farm in Beloit to the Arvold's hunting preserve last Sunday. Richard had donated a very nice bull for a hunt by a disabled GI who was injured severely in Iraq. The hunt at Elk Rock Ranch is scheduled for mid-October. Dwayne and Don took the time to give us a guided tour of their hunting preserves. If anyone ever uses the phrase "Canned Hunt," send them to Exeland for a truly wilderness adventure. The new log cabin is almost complete and gorgeous. Hunters can also stay in a wall tent spike camp, right in the 540 acre hunting preserve.
On October 16th, Gary Goyke and I will be leading a Summit Meeting on CWD in Washington DC. We will be joined by members of WOW, NADeFA and other cervid organizations. Senator Russ Feingold has organized this meeting for us with USDA, APHIS and US Fish and Game to finalize rules and try to bring equity to what our livestock industry has been enduring compared to other livestock with animal health issues more serious than CWD. We appreciate Senator Feingold's concern for the rules and regulations that are unnecessarily crippling our industry. If you have information or ideas of areas you would like addressed in DC, please make sure I have them. Our group will meet in Washington on Sunday night and come to agreement on which issues are our top priorities.
At the NAEBA convention, I listened to Frank Keeton from Indiana tell of his experience and misfortune putting big dangle tags in calves. I have normally used a smaller sheep tag and later replaced it with the dangle (in addition to the WLIC tag.) Frank explained that the bigger tags move around more and can irritate the ear which then attracts flys and screwworms. The infected ear will noticably droop and eventually cause the death of the calf. Upon returning to Wisconsin we inspected all the calves and were relieved to see they were all fine. A week later, the drooping ear was obvious in one of the calves. Fortunately, Frank had also said that removing the tag, spraying the area with Catron, and giving 3 cc's of LA200 would take care of it if you caught it early enough. Thanks to his advice, we saved the calf and learned another lesson in what not to do in the future.
Some of the semen we will be AIing with is from the Keeton's; his two year old son of King Kong called CrackerJack which scored over 400 unofficially this year.
Sincerely,
Joel Espe
WCDEFA President
June 2005
Message From WCDEFA President Joel Espe
"Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe." H.G. Wells
The International CWD Symposium planned at Monona Terrace in Madison this July includes a charter bus trip to our elk ranch in Monticello to see a working cervid facility and hear of the problems we have all faced and especially the emotional and financial stress put on those who have been quarantined through no fault of their own. Past President Dave Gilbertson is tentatively scheduled to present their situation as well as Dr. Bourie from DATCP on how CWD has affected his department. There will be a social titled "Deer and Beer" at the Capital Brewery in Middleton for all attendees which is co-sponsored by WCDEFA, WOW and possibly NADeFA. At the last symposium of this kind in Colorado, elk ranchers needed the Governor's intervention to even be allowed in. We are now a part of the presentation. If anyone is available to come down ahead of time to tidy up or just be there to help explain our industry to others, it would be greatly appreciated.
Those of us who have earned money while working on the WLIC Pilot Project have donated it all back to WCDEFA. The initial purchase from those funds was a "Sodbuster" offset disc and harrow from Antler King. Todd Stittleburg made us a very nice deal on this piece of equipment which we will be picking up shortly. Those who attended our convention saw Todd's video of the sodbuster being used in putting in food plots. This machinery has high speed hubs and can be attached to any 2" ball hitch and pulled on the highway behind your vehicle. We hope this is something our members will use, and will be one more advantage of belonging to WCDEFA. We are also looking at an enclosed trailer to house and move our two displays as another purchase.
Indiana is in serious trouble right now. The DNR there is making an all out move to put all hunting preserves out of business. Take the time to send an e-mail to the address fencedhunting@dnr.in.gov and let them know you support hunting preserves. This battle will spread to other states if Indiana pushes this through. You can send one e-mail for every member of your family. Look for the Indiana articles elsewhere in this newsletter for details on this atrocious action taken by a government agency.
In the midst of the excitement of new calves hitting the ground, concern over lack of rain, and preparing for this CWD farm visit in July, we are busy preparing a variety of food plots for your inspection and our research. Midwestern Bio-Ag from Blue Mounds, WI completed soil analysis and will be bringing a fertilizer blend this week-end to adjust our soil appropriately after which I will be putting in 1 acre food plots of different blends from Purina Mills, Antler King and Bucks and Does Wildlife Products. I will be keeping records on growth and palatability of the different varieties with my animals over the next couple of years if any of you are interested.
Please go out and sell those raffle tickets, the more we sell, the more money for our Association. My personal goal was $1,000.00; I'm 80% there.
Joel
March 2005
Message From WCDEFA President Joel Espe
I would like to thank all of you for your overwhelming support in my election as your President; I tried to run a clean campaign. Congratulations to your new Vice-President, Dr. Sam Vainisi, and Board Members Richard Spanton, John Gooch, Rob Marr and Bob Dahl.
For the past few years, Dave and Gwen Gilbertson have been targeted and endured a great deal with quarantines for CWD and more lately suspected TB. During that time, both have gone above and beyond the call in supporting our industry and association. We are all indebted to their help, determination and loyalty. Congratulations are also in order to Bob and Janet Dahl for organizing an excellent convention, website and newsletter. Pictures from the convention are already available on the WCDEFA website - www.wcdefa.org.
Our bulls are dropping antlers and in a couple of months, our cows will be dropping calves. As this incredible cycle of life unfolds again in all of it's glory, so is our fight to raise these majestic animals continuing. It doesn't matter whether we have reindeer, fallow deer, red deer, sika or elk, we are all involved in the attempt to survive the increasing regulations, closed markets, one-sided press and the ever-popular manufactured crisis of CWD and it's expanding eradication zone. It seems we have given up a lot of ground in this fight the last few years due to these issues, but that is about to change.
The Federal Government has heard our arguments and have officially listed our cervidae as livestock. The Farm Bureau organization is willing to use their power and influence on our behalf with DATCP. Our pilot project with WLIC has aligned WCDEFA with all livestock associations in the state. The various beef, dairy, equine etc. groups have heard what we have been subjected to, and I have reminded them that we are the test cases and they can be next. The Winchester Corporation had a website covering CWD and game farmers were once again unfairly blamed. After some calls to their corporate headquarters, they apologized and removed all of the information.
Next month, Dave Gilbertson, Rich Spanton and myself will join members of WOW, lobbyists and game farmers from other states in Washington D.C. to meet with Congressmen/women and federal agencies to address needed changes and equality. The statistics should be clear by this time that the CWD scare was very beneficial to the DNR who have the problem and catastrophic to our members who don't have the problem. 8066 of our animals have tested negative for CWD, out of 8067. According to their own definition, the one alleged positive was probably a false positive.
I would appreciate feedback from all members on major issues you would like discussed with our federal legislators in April and with our state legislators on March 23. We need every member available in Madison on that date to make sure our message is heard and understood.
Please feel free to contact me with any questions, concerns, or ideas you may have. I can be reached at:
Work 608-437-2400 ext 3206
espejoel@mhasd.k12.wi.us
Home 608-938-1137
Cell 608-558-8445
espe@tds.net
Thank you again for your support in my election. I look forward to working for you and with you.
Sincerely,
Joel K. Espe WCDEFA President