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Mark Freeman Commentary Patience may be a hunter�s best friend CENTRAL POINT � Each spring since 1996, Ken Mellow has filled out his $4 controlled-hunt lottery applications for deer, elk, antelope, bighorn sheep and mountain goat. The 45-year-old grocer from Central Point always figures he�s got a chance to get the deer or elk tag, while the antelope tag is the one he really wants. The applications for the rare sheep tag and even rarer goat tags are the wildlife wish-list tags, such long shots for winning that Mellow sees them more as a donation to the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife than anything. "It�s just a $4 throwaway, really," Mellow says. Now, look who�s going goat hunting this fall. The throwaway application boomeranged Saturday for Mellow, who beat big odds to land the single toughest tag to draw in Oregon. Come September, Mellow will embark on one of the state�s true once-in-a-lifetime hunting opportunities. Mellow won one of three mountain goat hunting tags offered by the ODFW this year through its computer lottery draw, whose results were made available last week. With 4,301 hunters vying for the three tags, the odds of drawing a tag are 1 in 1,433.66 � the lowest odds of any Oregon big-game lottery tag. The odds of Mellow ever repeating his lottery luck are zero; Oregon laws ban former winners from ever claiming another goat tag. So Mr. Mellow isn�t. "I don�t think I realized until Sunday what exactly I had done," Mellow says. "It was like, whoa, I better get in shape." If not, his 12-day stint in Eastern Oregon�s Elkhorn Mountains could be a as rough-and-tumble as the terrain. In fact, the two hardest parts about hunting mountain goats in Oregon are drawing a tag and preparing your body to withstand the rigors of traversing the cliffs and pinnacles built for critters with forked hooves. To hunt goats is to scratch and scrape your way across Eastern Oregon�s toughest moonscapes under hot sun and within thin air. "The terrain is what makes this a tough hunt," says Todd Callaway, an ODFW assistant wildlife biologist in Baker City, just east of the Elkhorns. "It�s very steep, with very few roads out there. "When guys come in here after their goat hunt, they have big blisters on their feet and are hardly able to walk," Callaway says. But they always come in with a billy in the pickup bed. The Rocky Mountain goat ( Oreamnos americanus ) is built to survive in the highest, harshest and most barren mountaintops of the Pacific Northwest, western Canada and Alaska. Oregon has two goat populations, with herds in the Wallowa and Elkhorn mountains both sporting about 100 animals. Both the male billies and the female nannies have similar snowy-white and puffy coats of coarse hair over incredibly thick skin, and black horns. But the billies have horns that swoop backward, while the nannies have horns that stand more straight up, then curve back at the tips. Unlike other big game, they suffer little predation because cougars and other predators rarely venture into their hostile territory. Falls kill more kids (young goats) than anything else. Those that don�t fall graze on whatever greenery exists on the moonscapes of the Elkhorns, and in winter will fight bitterly to defend even small tufts of exposed grass. Life at 9,000 feet is tough, but it�s also a woman�s world. Nannies run the show, while billies tend to hang out alone. That�s why goat hunters take identification courses to learn how to differentiate the billies from the nannies. Hunters are asked only to shoot the males, with big ones weighing about 300 pounds. Mellow knew nothing of this, even as his ODFW controlled-hunt results postcard came in Saturday�s mail. Of his five applications, he drew only the goat tag. "I thought, goat ?" wife Judy Mellow says. "What are they going to do with that." What Mellow will do is become one of three hunters this fall to take a goat during the Sept. 9-20 hunt. He�ll first take an orientation course from the ODFW in Baker City, study some maps, get some access points and start the first of many pre-hunt scouting trips with friends as early as mid-July. He�s also working on getting in shape. "I learned I got the tag on Saturday," he says, "and by Monday, I was on a diet and working out." Mellow also is scouting out taxidermists for the hide and recipes for the meat. "Everybody keeps asking me, �Do you eat those things?�" he says. "They�re pretty good eating, from what people tell me. "Of course," he says, "I�ll have to kill one first." History is on Mellow�s side. Since the Elkhorn Mountains hunt began in 1996, all six goat tags issued for the hunt have been filled. The goats are easy to find, the ODFW�s Callaway says, by sitting in a canyon or a ridge line in the morning and glassing the Elkhorns� eastern slopes. The morning sun illuminates the white goats against the rocky background, leaving hunters the time and opportunity to creep close enough for a level shot � often from 100 yards or less, Callaway says. "They�re not a really wary animal," Callaway says. "They won�t see you two miles away and run off." But getting within 100 yards will be the test to Mellow�s mettle. "They�re in some really nasty places," Callaway says. "It�ll take a lot of physical endurance to get a shot and pack one out." Mellow says he�ll be ready for the challenge, thanks to a well-placed $4. "I guess I put a little faith in the system," Mellow says. "You never think anybody is going to win one of these things, let alone you doing it yourself. "But here I am," he says. (Staff writer Mark Freeman covers the outdoors for the Mail Tribune. 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