300 Goats Are Slated for Reprieve on Catalina Island

For years, the caretakers of Catalina Island have used shotguns and sometimes helicopters to rid the island of its pesky goat and pig populations--a periodic slaughter that has outraged animal-protection groups locally and across the nation.

Now, animal activists say they have come up with a bloodless alternative to buckshot. Venice resident Bill Dyer, of In Defense of Animals, said activists have raised $25,000 to roundup and relocate 300 goats to Northern California, where the animals’ ravenous munching will be used to clear hillsides of brush--the ready fuel of wildfires.

Today, five goat herders and six border collies from the Bay Area company, Goats R Us, will pitch camp on the rugged island and begin a three-month goat roundup. The 300 goats targeted for roundup represent about 70% of the island’s total population.

This offer of clemency does not apply to all the island’s goats and pigs--animals that were first domestic but later went wild. The “great goat lift” represents a grudging compromise between animal activists and island ecologists who say the nonnative beasts are destroying the island’s natural habitat.

The Catalina Island Conservancy, the entity that owns all but a sliver of the island and operates under a mandate to return the area to its natural state, will continue to hunt goats along the island’s Pacific shore bluffs and canyons. Also, Dyer said he couldn’t convince anybody to adopt the legion of loose pigs that dig and root there, denuding hillsides of grass and tearing up gardens in search of bulbs, lizards and other swine fare.

Those who oppose the hunt say the compromise represents a great step forward in the emotional debate. “We’re hoping that this will encourage people to this alternative worldwide, anywhere there are feral animal removal programs,” Dyer said.

Before Dyer and others can claim victory though, they must confront one enormous obstacle: Most feral goats die soon after they are captured, due mostly to stress. The island’s conservancy once attempted a similar roundup in the 1970s with dismal results, according to William Bushing, the conservancy’s vice president for science, education and ecological restoration. “When we tried it, the mortality rate was 88%,” Bushing said. “The trappers we had hired finally told us it wasn’t worth their effort.”

Acknowledging that past removal attempts have resulted in many dead goats, animal activists say that herders have perfected methods of capturing, transporting and feeding the animals.

Goats first arrived in Catalina in the 1820s--some say they were brought by Spanish missionaries--and have thrived on the 21-mile-long island. Pigs were imported in the 1930’s to root out snakes. Dyer said he could not find a willing host for the undetermined number of pigs.

In the 1970s, the owners of the island, the Wrigley family of chewing gum fame, created the conservancy and donated most of Catalina, about 88%, to the nonprofit organization. The conservancy’s mandate was to restore the island to its natural state. By then, the pigs and goats were on the verge of wiping out the native wildlife, according to Bushing.

After years of attempting to thin out the herds of pigs and goats, conservancy officials say they have decided that their only solution is to remove or eliminate them all. For this reason, they have given the activists until Jan. 1 to capture the goats. After that, whatever is left will be killed.