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Massachusetts has not found CWD, and tests deer to keep checking

Massachusetts CWD Testing and Deer Carcass Rules

Massachusetts has no CWD and requires no testing, hunters can have MassWildlife biologists sample their deer at a check station though the agency will not test a deer on individual request, and a deer family animal from any state outside New England may enter only if it has been deboned, with cleaned skullcaps, headless hides and finished mounts also allowed.

Not required
Is a sample required
a test is offered on any deer
Boned out
Carrying a carcass in
No whole carcass from anywhere
See the agency
What the test costs
no turnaround published
Not reported
Found in wild deer
no zone drawn
The answer

Is CWD testing required in Massachusetts

Voluntary, offered statewide

Massachusetts reports no detection in wild deer, and Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife sets no requirement to submit a sample. A test is offered on any deer a hunter brings in.

How to submit
Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife names check station.

MassWildlife’s drop off locations

MassWildlife biologists collect lymph node samples for CWD testing from hunter-harvested deer for ongoing surveillance. At this time, MassWildlife cannot accept individual testing requests.
Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD), Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife, read September 23, 2026. Read it at the source
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Driving a deer into Massachusetts

What may be carried across the Massachusetts line

This is the rule a hunter is most likely to miss, because it is written by the state being entered rather than the state the animal was taken in. Reading the regulations of the state hunted in cover to cover does not surface it. Nationally, 42 of the 50 states restrict what crosses and 27 refuse an intact carcass from anywhere at all.

No whole carcass from anywhereA hunter driving home to this state boned the animal out before the line, whatever state the hunt was in.

An intact carcass may not be carried into Massachusetts from any other state, apart from Connecticut, New Hampshire, Maine, Rhode Island and Vermont. The parts MassWildlife does admit are listed below.

Harvested deer family animals that have not been deboned may not be brought into Massachusetts from any state outside New England, and only deboned meat, cleaned skullcaps, hides without the head and fixed taxidermy mounts may be imported.

What MassWildlife admits, in its own categories:

  • deboned meat
  • cleaned skullcaps
  • hides without the head
  • fixed taxidermy mounts
Prohibited: Importation of harvested members of the deer family (white-tailed deer, elk, moose, etc.) from any state outside of New England (CT, NH, ME, RI, VT) that have not been deboned. Cleaned skullcaps, hides without the head, and fixed taxidermy mounts may be imported.
Deer hunting regulations, Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife, read September 23, 2026. Read it at the source
Where the state stands

CWD in Massachusetts: status, zones and baiting

Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife reports no detection of the disease in Massachusetts's wild deer herd.

Baiting and feeding
Baiting and feeding banned statewide
Carcass waste
MassWildlife says to put carcass parts in a landfill or leave them near where the deer was killed, and to follow state and local carcass disposal guidelines.
At this time, there is no evidence suggesting CWD is present in Massachusetts.
Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD), Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife, read September 23, 2026. Read it at the source

Massachusetts draws no management or surveillance zone, which means its rules apply the same way in every county. Several states added a first zone within a season of a first detection, so a zone boundary is the part of a state's rules most likely to change.

A green steel dumpster stencilled DEER CARCASS mounted on a single axle trailer in a sandy pine clearing, with a hoist gantry beside it and a pile of soil behind
The disposal end of the same trip, parked in a pine flatwood with a gantry to hang a deer from. Forty one states publish a rule about what happens to the bones and the head after the meat comes off, and in most of them it reads the same way: landfill, or back on the property where the deer was taken, and nowhere else. It is the part of the law that applies whether or not anybody ever asks for a test. “Deer carcass disposal”, The Bushranger, CC BY-SA 4.0

Massachusetts CWD questions

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CWD rules in other states

CWD rules in every stateHow the 50 states differ on sampling, cost and what crosses a state line.Venomous snakes by stateWhich species a state actually has, and where the range maps put them.Burn permits by stateWhether a permit is needed today, and who issues it.Firewood permitsWhat a cord off public land costs, and which forests still sell one.Massachusetts tick activityThe weather driven tick index for Massachusetts, updated daily.

Massachusetts read September 23, 2026 from Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD), Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife, linked above. Carcass rules, zone boundaries and sampling requirements change between one season’s regulations and the next, and a state can add a rule mid season after a new detection, so the MassWildlife document linked above is the one that governs. Every state is on the CWD testing hub.