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West Virginia has found CWD and tests any deer a hunter brings in

West Virginia CWD Testing and Deer Carcass Rules

Testing is free but voluntary and is offered for deer taken in the eight county Containment Area, and a deer killed inside the seven shaded containment counties may only leave them as meat, a cleaned hide, a clean skull plate, antlers or a finished mount.

Not required
Is a sample required
a test is offered on any deer
Restricted
Carrying a carcass in
No whole carcass from an affected state
Free
What the test costs
turnaround below
Yes
Found in wild deer
CWD Containment Area
The answer

Is CWD testing required in West Virginia

Voluntary, offered statewide

West Virginia has found the disease in wild deer, and West Virginia Division of Natural Resources sets no requirement to submit a sample. A test is offered on any deer a hunter brings in.

How to submit
West Virginia Division of Natural Resources names head drop-off locations and agency office.
What it costs
West Virginia Division of Natural Resources puts the test at no charge to the hunter.
How long results take
the agency warns results may be delayed by a week or more when laboratory volume is high
The zone it draws
CWD Containment Area

WVDNR’s drop off locationsLook up a result

Head drop-off locations are available at the District 2 Office (Hampshire County), Sleepy Creek WMA headquarters (Berkeley County) and the Spring Run State Fish Hatchery (Grant County).
2026-2027 West Virginia Hunting and Trapping Regulations Summary, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources, read September 23, 2026. Read it at the source
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Driving a deer into West Virginia

What may be carried across the West Virginia 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 an affected stateWhether the drive is legal turns on where the animal was taken rather than on how it was packed.

An intact carcass may not be carried into West Virginia from a state or province where the disease has been found. An animal from anywhere else falls outside the rule.

A cervid killed in a state where CWD has been found may be brought into West Virginia only as boned out meat or quarters and thoroughly cleaned skull plates, hides, antlers or finished taxidermy mounts, and the same list is the whole of what may be brought in from a fenced enclosure anywhere.

What WVDNR admits, in its own categories:

  • boned-out meat
  • quarters
  • thoroughly cleaned skull plates
  • hides
  • antlers
  • finished taxidermy mounts
If you kill a cervid out of state in a fenced enclosure, only boned out meat or quarters and thoroughly cleaned skull plates, hides, antlers and/or finished taxidermy mounts may be transported into the state.
Chronic Wasting Disease in West Virginia Deer, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources, read September 23, 2026. Read it at the source
Where the state stands

CWD in West Virginia: status, zones and baiting

West Virginia Division of Natural Resources has confirmed the disease in West Virginia's wild deer. The agency reports positives from seven eastern counties and says road killed deer in every county have been tested continuously since 2002.

Baiting and feeding
Banned inside the zones
Moving an animal out of a zone
Nothing of a deer killed in Berkeley, Grant, Hampshire, Hardy, Jefferson, Mineral or Morgan counties may leave those counties except boned out meat, quarters with no spinal column or head attached, a cleaned hide with no head, a clean skull plate with antlers, bare antlers and finished taxidermy mounts.
Carcass waste
The agency prefers carcass waste double bagged and sent to a landfill when the animal was not quartered in the field, and says not to dump it where other deer can reach it.
In West Virginia, CWD has been found in 902 white-tailed deer.
Chronic Wasting Disease in West Virginia Deer, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources, read September 23, 2026. Read it at the source

Zone boundaries are redrawn between seasons more often than any other rule here, usually after a new detection near an existing line. The map linked above is WVDNR's own and is the one that governs.

A small white steel shelter on a gravel pad with one open bay and a sign reading LDWF CWD TESTING CONTAINER SITE beside a deer silhouette, bare trees behind it at dusk
A freezer container site, open at the side and lit at night. A state that wants samples from a whole parish cannot staff a counter for three months, so it buys a cooler and a sign and takes the head whenever the hunter finishes. The tag in the box is the part that matters: everything the lab can tell a hunter later depends on the paper that went in with the head. “LDWF CWD Testing Container Site 01”, Ktkvtsh, CC BY 4.0

West Virginia 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.West Virginia tick activityThe weather driven tick index for West Virginia, updated daily.

West Virginia read September 23, 2026 from Chronic Wasting Disease in West Virginia Deer, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources, 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 WVDNR document linked above is the one that governs. Every state is on the CWD testing hub.