Captured mountain goats from Olympic National Park being delivered to a staging area where they are cared for by veterinarians and then transported in refrigerated trucks to the northern Cascade Mountains for release.
NPS Photo - J. Burger
Mountain goats (Oreamnos americanus) are not native to the Olympic Mountains. Before the establishment of Olympic National Park in 1938, twelve mountain goats were introduced in the 1920s by a sportsman’s group. Over time, the population grew to over 1,000 individuals and goats expanded to colonize the entire range. They had visible impacts on the sensitive alpine ecosystem: damaging soils, threatening rare plant species, and altering plant communities. They also proved dangerous to humans, as they sought salts that do not exist in the Olympic Mountains but are often present in human urine. In 2010, a park visitor was fatally gored by a mountain goat while hiking.
National Park Service management policies call for management up to eradication of exotic species if prudent and feasible and when the exotic species damages the park’s natural and cultural resources (NPS 2006 Section 4). Between 1981 and 1989, the park removed over 400 goats, of which 88% were translocated, in an effort to control their population. Over time the population increased again, reaching around 725 by 2018. At that time, the park, in cooperation with the US Forest Service, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW), and in consultation with traditionally affiliated Tribes, finalized a Mountain Goat Management Plan to completely remove goats from the Olympic Peninsula. The final plan has two phases: a five-year active management phase, and a subsequent 15-year maintenance phase.
The goal of the first phase of the plan was to remove over 90% of the goat population using aerial capture and translocation. Four aerial capture operations were conducted from 2018–2020, during which 325 goats were translocated by WDFW to the Cascade Range where they are native. This was followed by lethal ground removal operations involving 98 highly skilled volunteers (20 teams) in September and October of 2020 removing 31 goats. Four subsequent aerial lethal removal operations were conducted in 2021 and 2022 removing an additional 192 goats. The last of these took place in August 2022, when only three goats were removed during the two-week operation. In total, 548 goats were removed during the active management phase, over 59% of which were translocated. It is expected that some goats remain at very low numbers and are hard to detect. The active management phase was completed in 2022.
As of 2023, the park and goat management partners have been in the maintenance phase of the plan with the goal of complete removal of all mountain goats remaining on the Olympic Peninsula.
