MOUNT EVANS, Colo. (AP) — Lance Carpenter is standing on a lichen-covered boulder somewhere around 13,000 feet (3,962 meters), his binoculars zeroed in on the target: the backside of a mountain goat kid.

The goat is about 20 yards (18 meters) away, grazing alpine forbs alongside its nanny. Carpenter is keeping up a conversation, but his eyes are on the kid's tail, waiting for it to rise and stick out horizontally.

The little guy is marked with a red dot on the side of its shaggy, white neck — a dot Carpenter put there a few weeks back with a paintball gun. This is how Carpenter, a wildlife bio...