Mountain goat hunt south of Tracy Arm closes early after hunters reach limit

Mountain goat hunters have reached this season's harvest guideline south of Tracy Arm, the glacier-lined fjord south of Juneau, and the area closes to goat hunting at 11:59 pm Friday.

That's 17 days before the season was set to end on Nov. 30. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game said it is closing the hunt to help preserve the area for future goat hunting, according to its emergency order.

The guideline isn't a simple number of goats. The department uses a point system: a billy counts as one point and a nanny as two. The area's guideline is nine points, so it could take as few as five goats or as many as nine to reach it, depending on how many were nannies. The order doesn't break down this year's harvest.

The closed area covers the land between Tracy Arm and the ridge that separates it from Endicott Arm to the south, from near Harbor Island to South Sawyer Glacier and the Canadian border. The rest of the hunt area isn't affected by this order.

The area also closed early last year. A 2025 order shut it Nov. 15 under the same nine-point guideline, after hunters took seven billies and one nanny.

Two other goat areas in the region have already closed this season. The Point Windham zone closed Aug. 8 after a single goat filled its one-goat quota. The Eagle Glacier to Sawmill Creek area closed Oct. 4, with the department citing low population counts.