Wausau Daily Herald
By Jessica Bock
Wednesday, August 28, 2002

A bird in Marathon County has tested positive for the West Nile virus, confirming the disease’s spread into northern Wisconsin, according to the state Department of Health and Family Services.

Marathon County was among 27 counties in Wisconsin listed on the department’s Web site with infected birds or horses. Two other counties, Adams and Winnebago, have cases in a human and bird. The virus has been detected in humans, horses, or birds in at least 41 states.

A Langlade County woman who cares for more than 100 birds is worried about the impact of the virus on northern Wisconsin.

One great blue heron from Langlade County died and tested positive for West Nile, said Marge Gibson, executive director of the nonprofit organization Raptor Education Group Inc., in Antigo. Gibson is awaiting test results on several other birds in her care showing symptoms of the disease, including one from Marathon County.

“Seeing this creep into the Northwoods is really uncomfortable,” Gibson said. “We know it’s coming and there’s nothing you can do to stop it.”

Most of the birds with West Nile symptoms seem to be recovering, Gibson said, but now she and her staff of three must prevent the other birds, including 26 bald eagles, from becoming infected.

The Raptor Education Group, which receives its funding through grants and donations, cares for most of the injured birds in Wisconsin until they are ready to be released back into the wild.

Gibson plans to take precautions such as putting up screens where birds are kept to keep them safe from mosquitoes that could transmit the disease, a project she said will be expensive and time consuming.

“It’s a very stressful time,” Gibson said. “Something like this can just wipe out a nature class.”

Labs in Madison are busy this summer with the combination of tests for chronic wasting disease in deer and now the West Nile virus, said Rick Weide, wildlife biologist with the Department of Natural Resources office in Rib Mountain.

West Nile is transmitted to humans by mosquitoes that have bitten infected birds. The virus has claimed 23 lives and infected 453 people nationwide this year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. An elderly Adams County man was among the victims.