Mountain goats are native to the North Cascades, but not the Olympic mountains.
Goats need salt. The North Cascades have salt licks, the Olympics do not. There, the goats have only one salt source: Hikers.
Consequently, the “Olympic National Park in Washington had a huge problem: [very friendly] mountain goats … addicted to human urine,” Daily Beast says (here).
That article says “had” because the Park Service captured and relocated about half of them to the North Cascades, and tried to shoot the ones too slippery to catch, but they couldn’t get them all (you never can). The Daily Beast says the remaining population “is low and they are no longer harassing hikers for pee.”
Still. You probably want to look around, especially behind rocks, before pulling it out for a trailside pee. And not just for female hikers coming up the trail.
Click on goat to activate interaction with hiker
