In Washington ’s Olympic National Park , mountain goats have become quite the nuisance , so much so that common authorities have begun airlifting them out of the area with the help of the National Park Service and the USDA Forest Services , fit in toPopular Mechanics . Their crime ? They ’ve developed an obsessive taste for human pee .
Mountain Goat are n’t aboriginal to the national green , but they ’ve lived there for almost a century . Just 12 goats were brought to the park by a hunt radical from Alaska and British Columbia in the 1920s , asThe Seattle Timesreported , but those few goats multiplied rapidly , and by the 1980s , there were thousands of them . The parking lot service has been seek to reduce the population for decennium , but the goats are on the rebound . There were more than 600 goatscountedin the commons in 2016 , and those number have been rising . There are estimated to be about 700 now .
Park functionary contend that all those foreign-born goats are chomp down on aboriginal plants , harm the parking area ’s singular ecosystem . They ’re also a significant threat to Mungo Park visitors . They ’re known to get too snug to visitors on trail , and some are strong-growing and hard to tag away . In 2010 , ahiker diedafter being gored by one .
Their attraction to human beings in the park has a gross system of logic behind it : Unlike in their aboriginal habitats , Olympic does n’t extend any of the natural common salt resources the Capricorn the Goat need to survive . or else , they ’re forced to hunt around for alternative source of common salt — like human piss and lather . “ Many tramp fuck too well about mountain goats ’ lust for salty excretions,”The Seattle Timesexplainedin 2017 . “ In some areas , goats seem to magically seem when hiker separate from their party to puddle . ”
As part of the effort to hit the baffling goats from Olympic National Park , officials are moving as many goats as they can to North Cascades National Park , where they ’ll supplement declining native goat populations . More than 600 goat will be captured , sedated , and airlifted out of the parking area . They ’ll be examined by veterinarians , fitted with GPS collar and transported to the Mt. Baker - Snoqualmie National Forest as part of the initiative . There , they will hopefully find more toothsome sources of salt than tramp ’ pee .
[ h / tPopular Mechanics ]
