Grand Teton resumes aerial goat gunning

JACKSON HOLE, Wyo. — Grand Teton National Park today announced aerial culling of mountain goats will begin Wednesday, February 23.

Previously, as part of the park’s 2019 Mountain Goat Management Plan, the park removed 36 mountain goats using aerial gunning in February 2020.

After receiving flak from several agencies and individuals including Wyoming Game and Fish, the park then instituted an organized ground-based cull using qualified volunteers. Some 43 mountain goats were removed during that cull in fall 2020. Another 20 goats were killed in fall 2021 but that season’s program was not without issues.

During the fall 2021 program, a team attempting to recover culled mountain goats was stranded overnight in technical terrain and required climbing assistance to descend the area the next day.

Park authorities say safety risks and difficulty in a ground-based removal would only be increased given the remaining 25-35 goats occupy the least accessible and most remote areas of the Teton Range. As such, aerial removal is a safer and more effective method of culling, they say.

The National Park Service cites a responsibility to protect native species and reduce the potential for local extinction of a native species of bighorn sheep within the park as reason for removing nonnative mountain goats from Grand Teton National Park.

Bighorn sheep have occupied the Teton Mountain Range for thousands of years, but today this native population is small, isolated from other nearby populations, and at risk of local extinction. As one of the smallest and most isolated herds in Wyoming, currently estimated at approximately 125 animals, the native Teton Range bighorn sheep herd is of high conservation value to the park, the Jackson Hole Community, and millions of visitors from around the world who visit the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.

Mountain goats were introduced into the Snake River Range in Idaho and over the years their population expanded and reached the Teton Range, numbering more than 100 animals before removal efforts were initiated in 2020. Mountain goats can carry bacterial diseases that are lethal to bighorn sheep. The Teton Range bighorn sheep population has been relatively isolated and are therefore likely ‘naïve’ to these diseases.

During aerial operations an area encompassing the northern portion of the Teton Range from Cascade Canyon to Berry Creek and extending from the base of the range west to the park boundary will be closed. Additional locations may be closed if mountain goats are located in other areas of the park.

Lethal removal activities will be performed by contractors with appropriate training, certifications, and skills in aviation operations and the safe use of firearm protocols.