As the 2015 deer hunting season draws near in The Lone Star State, tempers are growing increasingly short and the rhetoric is becoming, well, less than cordial, to put it lightly.

In case you happen to live in another of the 48 lower states not currently embroiled in a controversy involving the micro-management of its deer-breeding industry (estimated to generate some $2 billion annually), it all started when chronic wasting disease (CWD) was discovered in four whitetail at a Medina County ranch that raises the animals commercially to provide to hunting operations across The Lone Star.

Prior to the July discovery, the only other state-verified cases of CWD were in wild mule deer found in extreme West Texas, along the border with New Mexico.

In light of the July discovery of the always-fatal deer disease on the private ranch, Texas Parks and Wildlife stepped in to manage and monitor the situation, placing an immediate moratorium on the sale and transportation of deer from all the state's 1,300 deer-breeding operations. That did not sit well with the state's deer breeders, led by the Texas Deer Association, as the state game agency has no official authority over the private farms, which operate much like any other agricultural enterprise.

To that end, TPW reasoned its actions were appropriate and necessary, given its mandate to manage and protect the free-ranging deer and other wildlife across the state.

Historically speaking, let's just say there's not a lot of love and mutual admiration between Texas Deer Breeders and TPW. And, that goes both ways.

Since the disease was discovered on the vast South Texas ranch, staff of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department TPW and the Texas Animal Health Commission (TAHC) have created and finalized a Breeder Deer Movement Qualification Standards Plan that takes effect this week and will be in place through the 2015-16 Texas hunting season. The plan creates a framework for lifting the deer-transportation moratorium so breeders may move and sell their deer to hunting facilities in time for the beginning of the 2015 season.

Key elements of the plan include:

- A framework giving breeders who met previous movement qualified standards an option to move and liberate deer. Movement qualification is also dependent on administrative compliance with deer breeder permit regulations and statutes.

- Enhanced options for closely monitored herds with a status of "fifth year" or "certified" in the TAHC Monitored Herd Program. There are no additional release site requirements for ranches that receive deer only from these herds.

- Additional CWD testing in deer breeding facilities. Under the plan, the vast majority of the 1,300 permitted deer breeders in Texas can gain movement qualified status by testing two or fewer animals.

- There will be CWD testing requirements for a proportion of deer that are harvested on some release sites.

The situation has opened the door for critics of captive deer breeding and the commercialization of deer hunting, in Texas and elsewhere.

An op-ed appearing in multiple Texas newspapers last week from the group Texans for Saving Our Hunting Heritage suggested the continued movement (shipping) of deer from private breeders to hunting operations threatens the state's wild deer herd, the state's hunting heritage, rural economies and land values.

"Deer breeders represent a self-centered, short-sighted industry that has been allowed to hide under the veil of legitimate wildlife management for far too long," wrote Jenny Sanders, executive director of Texans for Saving Our Hunting Heritage. "They treat wild animals like livestock, and operate in a no-man's land where neither wildlife nor livestock rules apply. Deer breeders have only been compelled to conform to a more appropriate regulatory framework upon the discovery of CWD in a breeding facility."

Not surprisingly, those were fighting words to the Texas Deer Association, whose director charged the organization with "politicizing" the CWD situation. In a rebuttal op-ed this week, the association's executive director, Patrick Tarlton, charged the Hunting Heritage group with trying to divide the hunting community while it is in apparent agreement with many of the principles put forth by known anti-hunting groups like the Humane Society of The United States. (HSUS).

"If the disease is so devastating, state officials should require CWD testing at the same percentage rates in all facets of the Texas deer herds, both captive and wild -- period. Yet no mention has been made of mandating the testing of wild deer in Texas, only in captive and liberated deer," wrote Tarlton.

One thing's for certain, the forthcoming Texas deer season is shaping up to be one for the books – and for the newspapers, the hunting camps, the online forums and the social media...

And yes, as always, we'll keep you posted.

- J.R. Absher