Goat Attacks Lead Olympic Park To Urge Against Peeing Near Trails

PORT ANGELES, Wash. -- Olympic National Park in Washington state is urging hikers not to urinate along backcountry trails to avoid attracting mountain goats who lick urine deposits for salt.

The advice is part of a plan to avoid aggressive goats like the one that gored a Port Angeles, Wash., man to death in October.

The Peninsula Daily News reports the popular park also may close trails where goats follow people or enter camp sites.

Backcountry campers are advised to urinate 200 feet away from trails to prevent the trails from turning into "long, linear salt licks."

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Comments

[Buster Nitchski]

06:54 AM on 07/11/2011

Can you imagine standing in the middle of a trail, hangin' yer rat, and a goat walks up and gives you a beejay?

[Really I B Waiting]

10:06 AM on 07/10/2011

Sounds like its not just God, and the rest of the world that's had enough with us...

[archstantn]

08:14 PM on 07/09/2011

Damn those goats. Damn them to HELL!

[bealebkk]

05:17 PM on 07/09/2011

The park has many signs, how about another one'
'This is a peeing area No Goats allowed'

[Sunwyn Ravenwood]

04:26 PM on 07/09/2011

I used to live in Port Angeles and work in the park. The park is magnificent and reasonably safe if people would just follow a few simple rules. The only other person to get killed by an animal in the park was a child who was gored by an elk. His father told him to stand next to it so he could take a picture. I spent 18 years in the parks and 99% of the time when a human is injured by an animal it is the fault of humans, though not always the one that got hurt. People feed animals, then the next one comes along and the animal runs up expecting food. In Glacier NP the goats hang out in the Visitor Center parking lot licking up anti-freeze. Don't do anything to attract an animal is the best advice.

[Buster Nitchski]

06:57 AM on 07/11/2011

You are so lucky to have worked there. Olympic NP is maybe my favorite NP. Lots of great hiking memories. Absolutely magical place.

[Lynn Kangas]

04:23 PM on 07/09/2011

Wow, today is just a day for odd news stories popping up lol. Although this gives a new meaning to 'getting caught with your pants down" doesn't it? What a sad & painful way to have died, the people with that guy back in Oct had to have been horrified.

[Schneb]

01:11 PM on 07/09/2011

Gives new meaning to 'get your goat', and/or being 'pissed off'?

[lambdin1]

02:05 PM on 07/09/2011

Funny.

[Gottlieb]

12:21 PM on 07/09/2011

Goats are not the cute animals you read about in children's books. Even domestic goats will butt you if you are not careful. You should expect wild animals in wild places and not cartoon characters. Visiting wild places is still safer than crossing the street but you have to know the dangers.

[gneep]

10:35 AM on 08/02/2011

I had a friend that was a Goat and he was as gentle as a lamb.......

[ignacio sanabria]

10:15 AM on 07/09/2011

Hikers need to notify the goats about their kidney innerworkings.

[lzimbelman3]

09:58 AM on 07/09/2011

How about this: take an empty plastic jug along in case nature calls urgently? when one has to go, one has to go, period.

[MamaBird62]

05:53 PM on 07/10/2011

many responsible backpackers do just that
take only pictures - leave only footprints

[lzimbelman3]

07:41 AM on 07/09/2011

This section of news is aptly named: WIERD NEWS. I would expect to find stories like his and about the woman who stole bull sperm and the woman dying after having sex with a dog in those tabloids, but not on this web site for news.

[lzimbelman3]

07:09 AM on 07/09/2011

Well, its always been said, goats will eat anything. This is a first for me and I am closing in on being 68. A man being gored to death by one of those goats was also a first. I knew they would butt you and hard, but goring?

[SarcasticFringehead]

12:58 AM on 07/09/2011

I remember being with three of my backpacking buddies, up in the backcountry of the Sierra Nevada Mountains.

We had done a day hike away from our camp and were moving down the trail at a good clip. We came around a bend and there was a young woman, panties around her ankles, making water at the edge of the trail.

We moved by her so fast that I don't think she moved a muscle.

Besides being gored to death by goats, there are other more embarrassing things that can happen if you pee on the trail.

[KPinSEA]

05:38 AM on 07/09/2011

I used to live a block from a busy beach, I came home one day to find a young woman doing this in my side yard, hidden from the street.

Fortunately there were no goats in my neighborhood, although the racoons were fond of lurking in my cherry tree and scaring the bejeezus out of me when I came out the back door.

[SarcasticFringehead]

01:35 PM on 07/09/2011

Those racoons can get pretty big.
I remember walking our 20 pound dog one night and a large male racoon ran across a yard pretty close to us.
I'm positive he was bigger than our dog.

[kimryquips]

12:40 AM on 07/09/2011

Satisfying severe salt cravings by any means necessary as a murder motive. Now that is new...

[Alligator Breath]

03:34 AM on 07/09/2011

I doubt the goat sits by the trail contemplating what offense would cause it to attack someone. Wow.

[trumphent]

04:18 AM on 07/09/2011

Wasn't denial of salt an ancient form of slow torture execution?

[MW NY]

10:28 PM on 07/08/2011

I advised my daughter not to pee outside because it might attract old goats.

[coveark]

07:40 AM on 07/09/2011

OMG...LOL>>:-)..!!!!