[pct-l] Fw: Putting Mt. Goats in Gorge to Hunt

[ECPG at peoplepc.com (Carolyn Eddy)]

I have the full documentation of this if anyone is interested. I'm not a 
friend of
PETA but this is absurd. Anyone who has gone through the gorge would realize 
this is unsuitable for this species.

Carolyn Eddy

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Cascade Trail Buddies" <Trailbuds@earthlink.net>
To: "Carolyn Eddy" <ecpg@peoplepc.com>
Sent: Thursday, February 24, 2005 8:32 AM
Subject: FW: Putting Mt. Goats in Gorge to Hunt


Good morning Carolyn, isn't this the most heavenly weather!  I got this
stuff from my niece who is heavy into PETA.  She was just worried about the
hunting to control the placement, but after reading it all sorts of packgoat
use flags went up in my mind.  I didn't want to send this to the list if
NAPgA was already on it, but if you want to use it to start a thread go
ahead.

If this goes through we can kiss access to all of the Herman Creek area and
I had this flash of the obvious that the mountain goats could easily move on
up the PCT towards Lolo Pass and Timberline.  With all the talk of Mt Hood
becoming a national park and mountain goats in the Gorge, all of a sudden it
seems there will be no place for packgoats to go at all.

...and can you imagine the goats munching on all those beautiful wild plants
species!  Well, maybe a little Rhodie and water hemlock will manage the herd
nicely after all.

Becki

P.S.  Is it too late to get signed up for the conference. I was supposed to
be in Bend this weekend, but that fell through last night.  I didn't save
any of the info.

-----Original Message-----
From: Elisabeth Magnus [mailto:magnus@pcez.com]

Sent: Wednesday, February 23, 2005 4:02 PM

Subject: Putting Mt. Goats in Gorge to Hunt

Dear PETA members,

I'm a member of Friends of Columbia Gorge and the Portland chapter of
the Native Plant Society, and I'm contacting you about an urgent local
issue I think PETA might be very concerned about. The Oregon Department
of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW), working with the National Forest Service,
wants to introduce mountain goats into the Columbia River Gorge National
Scenic Area near Herman Creek, Dodson, and Tanner Butte, starting this
July. They are aiming for an eventual population of 300 goats and
hunting to manage their numbers (and reduce any environmental damage the
goats may do). Besides giving hunters a new species to hunt, the goats
are supposed to promote tourism.

The ODFW says the goats are native and they are "reintroducing" them.
But no specimens have ever been found there, and there are no firsthand
accounts of sighting them. Experts disagree on whether mountain goats
are native anywhere in Oregon, let alone the Gorge, and the ODFW's own
documents list them as non-native. Even if goats were present between
1813 and 1820, at the time of the hearsay reports, the habitat now may
well be radically different from the one then. The ODFW tried several
times to introduce goats into the Gorge in the 1970s, but in each
attempt the goats died. The ODFW thinks this time they can make the
project work by releasing more goats.

Experiments like these have a way of backfiring. In Washington, in the
Olympics, 11 goats originally introduced for hunters quickly spiraled
into a population of 1,175 and ended up causing so much damage (loss of
native plant cover, erosion, and invasion of weeds due to goats'
trampling, grazing, and wallowing in fragile areas; destruction of rare
plant species, displacement of native animals) that the National Park
Service concluded that the goats had to be eliminated-by aerial
shooting, since nonlethal methods of population control weren't working.
Mountain goats aren't easy to capture, and attempts resulted in high
mountain goat death rates.

Do we really want to meddle with this beautiful area and turn it into a
game farm? Why not import African antelopes and giraffes while we're at
it, and turn the place into Wild Safari? Is the Gorge, with its
spectacular and rare wildflowers, really not worthwhile in itself?
Apparently the ODFW and the Forest Service don't think so-they don't
even want to establish a proper monitoring program for how the goats
would affect existing native plant communities-for example, by studying
the plant cover and species of the area before the goats are introduced.
They say that they will take immediate steps to reduce goat numbers if
they find damage, but given how difficult and costly this might be,
wouldn't it be better not to introduce the goats in the first place?

Finally, allowing for regular hunting of mountain goats to manage their
population would mean that during the hunting season bullets would be
flying in the West Gorge in an area full of popular hiking trails. Why
should a few hunters be allowed to dominate the use of public lands that
are meant for everyone?

I hope PETA can take action on this policy. The ODFW is taking written
comments until March 8; address them to: Keith Kohl, ODFW 3701 W 13th
St., The Dalles, OR 97058
Fax: 541-2968-4993
E-mail: Keith.L.Kohl@state.or.us
Send copies to the U.S. Forest Service:
Dan Harkenrider
Forest Service Scenic Area Manager
902 Wasco Avenue, Suite 200
Hood River Oregon 97031
E-mail: dharkenrider@fs.fed.us
Fax: (541)386-1916
Ask for an Environmental Impact Statement to be prepared, as required
under the National Environmental Policy Act, and ask that the proposal
be reviewed for consistency with the Columbia River Gorge National
Scenic Area Act before any action by the Oregon Fish and Wildlife
Commission. These reviews could delay and, Friends hopes, ultimately
prevent this harebrained scheme from ever taking effect.

 If you'd like further info, attached are copies of a brief alert and a
more detailed comment on the subject from Friends of the Columbia Gorge.

Sincerely,
Elisabeth Magnus
503-226-7919