A traveling hunter is presented with an easy shot at his elusive quarry – but only at the risk of his own life. Should he take the shot?
Dawn broke crisply over the island, illuminating its cliffs in shades of impossibly lovely green. The thunder of waves pounding those same cliffs rose from several thousand feet below as I wrapped myself around a 
granola bar for breakfast. The afternoon before, I’d hiked several miles to access this remote location, searching for feral Hawaiian goats to hunt. I’d found some too, feeding and capering about the cliffs as dusk obscured the landscape. I tucked in beneath a big evergreen and slept the night away, dreaming of my morning rendezvous with the cliff-dwelling goats. Now, crunching the last crumbs of my granola-bar breakfast, I was ready to hunt.
Following a narrow ridgeline, I stalked the cliff-tops. The dirt was a dark magenta underfoot. Waterfalls cascaded from distant green cliffs, making their way toward the valley floor and the sea beyond. It felt like I was hunting in paradise until I looked over the cliff edge at the dizzying depths below. Then it felt like I was walking a tightrope above hell.
Now, I’m not afraid of heights and have spent my share of hours working on barn rafters and windmill motors high above the soil. But this kind of drop-off was new to me. I’m not super comfortable standing atop several thousand feet of elevation comprised of nothing but air. Staring into the hazy depths below gave me a discombobulating sense of lost balance and distant panic.
Jerked back from my depth-gazing reverie by the cheerful sound of goats bleating, I moved along the cliff tops until I could see the area the sounds emanated from. Soon I spotted a brown and white nanny with a big white kid, both feeding along the base of a ribbon cliff a couple of hundred yards below my position. I could harvest two goats with my current license, but hoped to take a billy; a young one if possible so the meat would be good. I continued to study the mountainside through my binocular. There, higher in the cliffs and closer to my position was a good billy. I dropped into a prone position, rested my rifle across my pack, and found him in the scope. He was standing quartered away from me, watching something in the distance. The shot was easy, the goat undisturbed. I picked up my rangefinder and hit the button: 135 yards. I looked at the cliffs. “There”, I told myself, “I think I could get down through that little slide, then edge across that ledge and drop through two little ribbon cliffs to the goat’s position”. I looked back at the little slide, the first part of the descent, and got a sick feeling in my stomach. It was steep smooth granite covered with pea gravel and funneled off the top of an enormous cliff. I could probably make it, though. I looked back through my scope at the goat, now feeding amongst the green.
Another goat moved across the cliffs; also a billy. He was even closer to my position, though further down the cliffs. I could probably get to him too, though one goat was all I wanted to pack over those rugged miles back to my truck. I looked back at the cliffs. A pair of lightweight, strap-on crampons; the ones mountain climbers fasten to their boots when crossing glaciers, would sure be handy right now. Those, and three hundred feet of climbing rope. I snuggled in behind my rifle, found the topmost billy in my scope, and settled the crosshairs on his vitals.
RIFLE, OPTIC, AND AMMO
The salt and sand of Hawaii are not the place to take a really expensive rifle, so I’d brought a simple lightweight stainless-steel bolt-action chambered in 6.5 Creedmoor. The riflescope was simple as well, a 4-16X40 Bushnell 4500 Elite. I couldn’t dial the scope for distance, however, there were gradated stadia lines in the reticle that enabled me to hold for accurate shots out to about 450 yards. In retrospect, a scope with a bit less magnification on the low end, say 2-12 power, would have been better. Shots can be very close when stalking through the jungle, and lower magnification would provide a better field of view at very close ranges.
My ammunition was Hornady’s excellent Precision Hunter ammo, topped with their 143-grain ELD-X projectile. Exiting the muzzle of my 20-inch barrel at about 2650 feet per second, it provides plenty of medicine for the goats that call the islands home.
SHOOT OR DON’T SHOOT?
Place yourself in my shoes; you’ve flown across the pacific, rented a truck, driven around the island, hiked miles into the backcountry, slept under a tree, and now you finally find yourself staring through your scope at a good opportunity to kill a nice goat. It’s almost a chip shot, and you’re very confident you can drop the goat cleanly.
But you don’t know if you can retrieve the goat after you shoot it.
Even if you are able to reach the goat, climbing back up through the cliffs with the meat in your pack will be incredibly dangerous. And if you fail – if you make even one misstep, the consequence will be death at the bottom of those giant cliffs.
Are you going to take the shot? Let me know what you’d do in the comments section below.
HERE’S WHAT HAPPENED (TRUE STORY)
I lay there watching those goats through my crosshairs for thirty minutes or more. Finally, I switched the safety to the on position and slipped away along the cliff tops in the hope of finding other goats in a more retrievable position. I found more goats, but never where I could safely access them. My time spent, I shouldered my pack and headed for the truck. It was an awesome hunt, in a spectacularly beautiful place.
And I was still alive.
I wouldn’t. I have let elk go because I knew I couldn’t get them back to the truck. The climb would have killed me.
Had a similar situation back in the 90’s in northern Idaho, I tracked this magnificent bull elk ten miles on trails thru the Bitterroot’s rough terrain were I could get a clear shot at him when I realized I’d have to haul it back those ten miles the same way with multiple trips a very good probability. Another thing that weighed on me was the fact that I had a forest ranger visit me the day before, warning me there was a large fire within ten miles of us and headed our way and I might have to leave the area if so ordered so I declined the shot and hoofed it back to camp. When I arrived at my camp the smoke from the fire was much heavier than when I’d left and a note was under my pick-up’s wiper blade to “GET OUT NOW” which I immediately complied with. Two days later I read in the paper that area had indeed burned thru were I was camped. I thanked my “hunting gods” for my good decision and hoped that magnificent bull made it our of there too.
I have seen the goats on the Big Island and non I saw would have been a easy retrieve. I saw nothing that I would have risked taking a shot Also saw turkeys and hogs. There is good trout fishing on the Island if you are willing to take the hike into the streams, they are long hikes in steep valleys, getting in fairly easy but you also have to come back out, not so easy.
Glad you made the decision you did.
Most of us think of this exclusively as an individual’s call; It’s my life to risk, regardless whether that risk is smart.
Please keep in mind the probability that at some point you will be missed, and search & rescue parties may be dispatched. Granted they may have resources unavailable to the individual hunter, but even helicopters go down in unforgiving terrain. The updrafts and downdrafts that pilots encounter in that sort of terrain are notoriously unpredictable. So you may be endangering others lives when you take unnecessary risks, causing rescue or body-recovery missions that could have been avoided.
Please use good judgement!
Did a lot of foolish things when I was younger but even then passed on big game shots that were to difficult to retrieve the animal. Made it to 70 but that next record bighorn sheep….well we will see if and when the time comes.
Good call! You went there to have a good/fun hunt and did it. Schlepping meat was not the point, to begin with. Congratulations on your wonderful adventure.
You made the right call. You go on a hunt to have a good time and enjoy yourself. Not worth getting hurt over.
i would hope i would have carried the extra weight of the rope. but since i have always considered a wounded or unretrievable animal as twice as bad as a miss , i think you made the right call.better luck next time.
While I’ve never been on a goat hunt, I did spend 3 years in Hawaii in the Marines. My buddies and I enjoyed climbing those mountains, the scenery was absolutely beautiful in any direction. While making our way through a pass, we had to jump a small drop off, that was a mistake. Not being able to make our way back, we had to cut around the horn. Practically 75-80 degree slope, I’ve never had my nerves tested like that before, and never want to again. A lot of wise men have lost their lives on a fools decision. I was almost one of those fools. Life is more than a foolish whim. Think smart, stay safe, stay alive.
Feral goats are invaders to Hawaii. They damage and destroy indigenous plants and destroy habitat for native animal life. In other words, they are vermin. If your goal is to kill a goat, take any shot you find. If you want goat meat, buy one, raise one, or go to the meat market.
This is THE choice that ALL ‘hunters’ have to make at one time or another, if you hunt long enough that is. ANY hunter that makes a shot on an animal that he INTENDS on wasting…just to kill, that’s nothing but bloodlust IMO and it’s what gives ethical hunters a bad name. Sure you could say the same for hunting “pigs/hogs” here in the lower 48 I suppose, which do REAL, COSTLY damage to crops, habitat, etc. I can’t speak on what most hunters do regarding the ‘final disposition’ of a typical hog hunt when they’re in a herd. Still, a hunter that leaves an animal lay..when it’s PERFECTLY GOOD meat doesn’t have MY respect..
lol been there, (didn’t) done that!
I had a cousin that died in a fall right in that area hunting goats. He was an experience hunter, but the terrain is very unforgiving. He shot the goat, packed it up, and fell while packing it out. So you made a good decision.
If you have little to no chance of retrieving the critter, you should let it continue to live it’s life.
Hunting for food includes being safe about it. To shoot and kill an animal that you can’t recover is unethical.
In the end, you made the correct choice.
You made the right choice. Ethics above ego. There will be other hunts to fill your game bag, but just being there and sleeping under the trees made it a trip to remember. Thanks for sharing.
I’ve observed Goats from a distance in Alaska. I enjoy getting as close as possible and observing them while they observe me. A good rifle is a comforting companion for personal security in desolate areas.
Feral animals are the greatest threat to endemic wildlife in many parts of the world. This is particularly true on Islands such as Hawaii (e.g. domestic cats, mongoose, hogs, snakes, etc.) Due to isolation, most native wild animals on Islands evolved without these exotic predators and competitors, and therefore have no resistance against them. I am concerned that Hawaii would even regulate the harvest of feral goats, given the damage exotic introductions have reaped on the Island. For that reason, I say shoot the invasive beast , and if you can’t retrieve it, at least you have eliminated one more pest from the beautiful Island. Call it a “Conservation Action” and move on to number two.
I would tend to agree. These were not a wild goat, they were feral in the description and do not deserve the protection of indigenous species. Although i understand the other commentators on the life lost when intentionally killing an animal and knowing your not going to retrieve it but that is not the point here. If one’s ethics does not allow them to take that invasive animal and leave it, then the overall preservation of the ecosystem that is being hunted is not a concern. Definitely a no shoot on a wild animal though.
My two cents.
I have only been hunting for 50 years or so..
But i have passed many “chip” shots when they were not in my favor.
The most memorable was a hard fought Bull Elk in Colorado.
After spending many hours climbing a ridge i found nothing.
But only a few hundred yards accross the canyon I spotted a 600 class bull slepping beneath a tree.
Could I make the shot?
Blindfolded for sure.
But if the Bull slid a thousand feet to the bottom the rack would be destroyed.
If he didnt slide down?
It would be noon the next day before I could reach him to field dress him and start packing him out.
Gaurenteed ruined meat and a couple days work for a set of horns.
I passed (after taking photos of him) and hiked back down.
It about the hunt, not the harvest.
But those memories will last a life time and inside (where it matters most) I know i did the right thing.
Joel Bingham – not sure if you have a type-o or are simply full of it. The world record “Spyder Bull” is 478. So, I cannot possibly believe that you were on a “600” class bull. That comment alone causes me to totally disregard your entire post.
I hear you Joel. Elk hunting is not for the faint of heart. It is why we take so few.
As Josey Wales once said, “Buzzards gotta eat. Same as worms.”
Bring some rope next time and learn how to rappel.
Dying with a backpack full of goat meat is still dying. You made a wise choice.
Maybe a guide could get you into a better location next time.
Good luck.
That shot was a NO-GOat. Good decision.
Why plan a trip to hunt in an environment not conducive to ‘tKe the shot’. Hunt with a partner who helps you when needed.
It’s about the adventure of the hunt, not the killing (unless it is for subsistence hunting for food). It would have been fun to pick out a rock nearby as a target just to test your shooting skills. I do that here in Alaska.
It was a great hunt! You simply (and wisely) chose not to pull the trigger.
Good choice… Live to hunt another day!
Life is important. However, the question I ask myself is can i retrieve the game. If the answer is no the shot should not be taken.
You made the right decision for the situation you were in. That is why scouting before the hunt is so important. I think you would have had everything you would have needed if you had done your homework. Good luck on the next hunt.
On 2 different hunts, I passed on the nicest Dall sheep I could have shot. Not worth it.
Take the shot with a camera. I am a meat hunter. My opinion is that he should have hunted lower and shot up as to having the game fall down. Next time analyze your hunt conditions??
“A man has to know his limitations…”
Exactly what I would have done. Why risk your life for a Goat.
Life over goats EVERY time.