 All this month, get up to $50 off any Android smartphone from Appalachian Wireless, any Android you desire. All $50 off with two-year agreement, better service, bigger savings, that's today's Appalachian Wireless and East Kentucky Network Company. Whether you are a hunter or not, if you live in eastern Kentucky, you will remember the 2017 EHD outbreak that has killed thousands of whitetail deer for years to come. It's just everywhere you go, you smell death. Jason Plaixico is a fish and wildlife biologist and he says the reports of dead deer have slowed down recently, but he says it's mainly due to the fact that deer have moved into the woods to eat the acorns that are falling. You know, there's probably still deer dying, there's no reason to think they're not, but it's just not happening right in front of people anymore. The 2017 EHD outbreak hit unprecedented levels in eastern Kentucky because it hit a month and a half earlier than expected and affected a wider population of deer than usual. You seem like you see it in three and a half years and older, but I mean I've had some instances where those in fawns are just right there together, but one thing's for sure, I mean this is no doubt the worst EHD outbreak we've had around here, well since I've been here 25 years. Fish and wildlife relies a lot on hunters to tell them more about the deer population because the hunters know their area and this time of year they can pretty much tell you about how many deer you can expect to see in a certain area, but this year some of them aren't seeing any. I keep a hunting log, on average every trip just scouting, I see 75 to 125 deer and six trips I've seen two deer. Chad's comments are duplicated over and over across our region prompting many bow hunters to stay home. It's legal to go out and hunt today, but it's not ethical. Everybody knows the issues we're having and if you say oh well it's not as bad as what everybody's saying you're lying to yourself because it's worse than what everybody's saying. During the first month of deer season nearly every county in eastern Kentucky is seeing harvest totals of less than half of where they were this time last year. Over the next few months here in eastern Kentucky the deer harvest numbers are going to determine if fish and wildlife officials will make any changes to the 2018 deer hunting season in eastern Kentucky. It's already on our radar about how to go about next year. With our new reporting system for the EHD outbreak we can see some counties have already lost more antlerless deer than were harvested last year before the season even opened. Reporting in Pikeville, I'm Shannon Deskins for EKB News.