Digital Bob Archive

The lonesome goat of Admiralty Island. That could be the title of a sad little story of a private effort to move wild animals from their natural habitat to somewhere else.

It was the Boone and Crockett Club of New York City that came up with the idea of capturing goats from the mainland and putting them on Admiralty Island. The club advanced two reasons for doing so, both of which sound a little specious. One was that on the island the goats \"would not have to contend with any of its natural enemies except the eagle\" and therefore should increase rapidly. The second was that they would be \"a commercial asset to the area because of the sportsmen they will bring in.\"

That was late in 1921 or early in 1922, and the Boone and Crockett people were at least willing to finance their fancies. They offered $180 each for a minimum of five goats, two males and three females. They got in touch with E.P. Walker, the local representative of the U. S. Biological Survey, which at that time had jurisdiction over Alaska game animals, to make the arrangements.

A lot of Juneau oldtimers scoffed at the idea. They said that wild goats could not be captured alive, and if captured, could not be handled safely. Two local men, however, were willing to try. Tom Miettinen and Carl Kavander loaded their two small gas boats with supplies and headed for the goat country. Where they went is not stated in the news stories, but it was probably Tracy Arm or Endicott Arm of Holkham Bay.

When they returned several weeks later, Stroller White wrote: \"The undertaking of capturing wild goats and planting them on Admiralty Island seems to work very well until the goats are consulted and then the proposition loses its lustre.\"

Tom and Carl brought one large and pugnacious billy, and had some scars to show for it. Its horns were described as \"sharp as needles,\" and for protection they had fastened a piece of alder wood across the tips. Two other goats had been captured, they said, but they insisted that after being in captivity for several days, one of them had committed suicide and the other died of a broken heart.

Walker immediately wired the Boone and Crockett Club asking for instructions, since there was only one goat. They wired back to release the one goat on the island at once and to try to fill the rest of the contract. \"The hunters left to free the goat at some isolated point,\" the newspaper reported.

The two men said it was too late in the year, and the danger from snowslides too great, to make another attempt in 1922. They felt that the next winter, when the snow was deep enough to drive the goats to the beaches, they could easily capture four more goats. But an examination of the Juneau newspapers the following winter has failed to turn up a report that they did so, or that they even went back to try. Perhaps they got to thinking about those sharp horns.

As for that lonesome billy goat on Admiralty Island, we do not have a report on him, either. He may have jumped over a cliff.