Officials at Grand Teton National Park have ended, for now, an effort to kill off the park’s population of nonnative mountain goats.
Volunteer hunters killed 43 goats over 6 weeks before an accumulation of snow led officials to end the hunt a couple weeks early because of hunter safety concerns from the snow.
Grand Teton wants to eradicate the 100 or so mountain goats because they compete for habitat with a native population of about 100 bighorn sheep and can spread disease to the bighorn.
Park officials switched to using hunters on the ground after shooting the goats from a helicopter drew criticism last winter.