Mountain goats in Glacier Peak Wilderness

[shanevg]

Hey everyone.  I've been looking through some of my maps trying to plan some trips for this summer and I was wondering if anyone knew anything about the Glacier Peak Wilderness. I am looking at some of the hikes off of the Cascade River road in Whatcom County (I think - maybe it's Skagit).  Does anyone know if there are mountain goats up by Cascade Peak, Mt. Formidable, Le Conte Mountain, Sentinal Peak, or anything in that range up there?  I've never hiked there myself but it looks like it has some good potential for Mountain goat country. 

Thanks in advance!

[Kain]

This site has some pics of goats on Mt Formidable if you scroll down.

http://www.cascadeclimber.com/mt__formidable.htm

[alecvg]

This site has some pics of goats on Mt Formidable if you scroll down.

http://www.cascadeclimber.com/mt__formidable.htm

The goats in there are interesting, looks like a fun area to chase them in.  That peak looks like fun to climb too!   

[Kain]

They look pretty tame to me.  The guy had the whole family at his tent.  Pretty cool though.

[Kain]

Just found these on the WDFW page.  It seems they have some mineral licks setup.  You may want to find them for some photo ops.

These guys move around.

2D record of mountain goat making repeated visits to a mineral licks near Glacier Peak.

3D view of GPS track of a mountain goat's 20 mile move from Glacier Peak (mineral lick) to Pinnacle Mtn. (normal range).

[shanevg]

Sweet, thanks!

[Old Mule]

I Hunted Goats up there in 87, spent allot of time scouting before season from the suiattle side over to the cascade side and all the way up to the Glaciers, Beautiful and very rugged Country be prepared. If you can find Old Maps they could help, most of the Old Trails aren't on Maps I found them while heading across country. Also I saw some really nice Bears If it's open make sure you have a Tag. No BS I saw 7 footers, one up by Bench Lake the other up the South Fork of the Cascade then up Milt Creek above Timberline, that was along time ago but I don't think they get botherd much, seems to be allot of Chocolates, Most of the Goats I saw were not to far up the South Fork Trail and up the middle fork by the Glacier, I Hunted all season to find a Billy bigger than the on I got in 76 the second to the last Day of the Season I Shot a Nine incher, not a Monster but I was more than Happy with it. I earned It. On a side note coming out of Downey Creek to the Suiattle River I ran into some Kids on the Trail one Day and they had a hole Stringer full of 18 to 24 inch Dollie Varden (or Bull Trout I don't know) It was somewhere around the 1st week of September, I always thought it might be fun to Hike up and Fly Fish for them.

[Smokepole]

I used to climb a lot in that area, since I grew up near Darrington.  Saw a herd of goats on the Sitkum Glacier, on Glacier Peak once.  We followed them all the way to Sitkum Col, and they disappeared over the other side.  There were a lot of crevasses at the time, and it surprised us to see them on the ice.  There are a lot of goats from Stevens Pass all the way along the crest into Canada.  I see a lot near Washington Pass and up to the north toward Golden Horn.  Saw a lot at Cascade Pass -- but you never know where they are going to turn up.

On a side note... I remember once we saw a black bear cross the Emmons Glacier on Mount Rainier at the 13,000 foot level.  He was moving across, going somewhere.  Lots of bears in the area you're talking about, especially in the remote areas in upper Illabot Creek.  Lots of closed roads and meadows you can bust into.  Lots of huckleberries.  For goats and bears I'd be inclined to check that area out, especially around Whale Lake and Mt. Tommy Thompson.