Biologists with the Great Smoky Mountains National Park want to release another 25 elk in Cataloochee Valley to join the experimental herd, but a ban on importing elk to North Carolina could hamper the park’s efforts.

The North Carolina Wildlife Commission passed a ban in 2002 on importing members of the deer family as a precaution against chronic wasting disease, a fatal disease for deer and elk that has cropped up in 13 states.

“It started in captive operations and spread to the wild. The closest it is now is in West Virginia,” said Wib Owen with the wildlife management division of the North Carolina Wildlife Commission.

Owen said there is no way to test elk for chronic wasting disease without killing them and getting a tissue sample from the brain stem. Elk can carry chronic wasting disease without showing signs, he said.

The Park initially planned to release 75 elk — one batch of 25 elk at a time for three years. Biologists would study the elk herd for five years and decide whether the release was succeeding. If not, they would remove the elk, which are originally native to the Southern Appalachians but because of hunting were totally eliminated from the region by the end of the 19th century.

After the first two groups of elk were released, park biologists decided to hold off on the third. The elk seemed to be surviving quite nicely at first and were largely staying put in Cataloochee Valley, where they were released, rather than dispersing through the park.

But now, park biologists say they want a third batch of elk after all because the herd has not grown as they hoped. Black bears are killing more than half of the newborn elk and there aren’t enough females — the initial herd was male-heavy, plus 75 percent of elk born in the park have been male. Park biologists also want another two years to study the elk before determining whether the releases will no longer be considered an experiment but a permanent reintroduction.

In the meantime, the state government has banned the transport of deer and elk into North Carolina, so park officials are asking the Wildlife Commission to grant them an exception, claiming there are healthy sources of elk.

Chronic wasting disease originated on deer farms and has largely been confined to states out West. This spring, however, chronic wasting disease was found in New York state in two captive herds and among wild deer nearby. Last month, it turned up in a deer in West Virginia in the wild, but in a county that is home to numerous deer farms.

“The discovery of chronic wasting disease on the Eastern Seaboard is very alarming,” said Evin Stanford, deer biologist with the N.C. Wildlife Commission. “Although we could never say with 100 percent confidence that we were free from the disease, we were somewhat comforted by the distance between us and the nearest CWD-positive area. Now, our comfort level has been somewhat reduced.”

Steven Dobey, the lead elk researcher with the Park, said the park’s source for elk are protected from contact with potential infected animals, however.

Land Between the Lakes, an elk preserve in Kentucky where the park got its first group of elk, has had no cases of chronic wasting diseases and is isolated from contact with wild deer in a 750-acre pen.

Elk Island National Park in Canada also has a safe heard, according to Dobey. Elk there have been isolated from the wild populations since 1910, enclosed in a 30,000- to 40,000-acre fenced area.

But whether the Wildlife Commission is willing to take the risk, however small, remains to be seen. The Wildlife Commission is largely oriented toward serving the interests of hunters and fishermen and is nervous about something that would jeopardize the state’s white-tailed deer population, it’s most popular big-game animal.

“We are comfortable that we are not jeopardizing the population of white-tail deer, but they (Wildlife Commission) have to reach that same comfort zone and make that decision,” said Bob Miller, spokesperson for the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

If the park is concerned about the survival rate of its elk, Owen questioned why the park couldn’t hold a bear hunt to thin out the elk’s predators.

The top answer is that hunting is illegal in national parks.

“The National Park Service’s mission is to preserve and protect the natural and cultural resources unimpaired for future generations, and that has been interpreted to prohibit any consumptive use of park’s resources, which is why we also don’t have logging,” Miller said. “Bears are native wildlife and we feel a natural balance between predator and prey will definitely exist.”