For those of you who don’t live in North America, here’s a very good video on skunks. This show was on PBS not long ago, and the striped skunks were awesome.
I can’t describe what skunk musk smells like. I really can’t.
It’s really not the smell that is bad.
It’s how it irritates your eyes and mucous membranes.
I say this as someone who has been skunked.
I had a dog that reveled in killing skunks, and she attacked one that was maybe 10 feet away from me one evening. As she shook it, the skunk wound up spraying me as “collateral damage.”
In some states, people can keep these animals as pets, but most states ban it because skunks have their own strain of rabies.
Incidentally, skunks are not weasels (Mustelids). They used to be classified with the weasels, ferrets, mink, otters, badgers, martens, and wolverines (gluttons). But now skunks and stink badegrs are in their own family called Mephitidae. Both skunks and Mustelids are members of the superfamiy Musteloidea, which includes the raccoon family (Procyonidae) and the red panda (Ailuridae). This suborder Caniformia within the order Carnivora. This suborder also includes dogs, bears, seals, sea lions and fur seals, and the walrus.
Finally, we supposedly have Eastern spotted skunks in West Virginia, but I have never seen one here. Those are the skunks that do handstands.
My previous dog had a close encounter with a skunk. OMG! I couldn’t believe how strong the smell was, and how long it lasted. Weeks, even with the neutralizer. Oh, and the tomato juice treatment…fuggagettabout it.
The video was worthy of an “Aw”.
I used to live in a small town where one lady kept raccoons and skunks as pets (her brother had foxes). They were domestic and all from Ruby Fur Farms. The things she taught me about skunks and coons were very informative, and I even got to meet her domestic striped skunk before he died. I might consider getting one if ever the time comes when I know I can care for it properly.
On a slightly related note, some domestic mustelids are having the same issues as pedigreed dogs: they are inbred and dying of almost predictable causes at younger ages, especially the ones which come from the breeding farms like Ruby’s or Marshall’s. Unfortunately, these are rather large suppliers and it’s apparently hard to find one of these animals in the US that doesn’t have a background from one of those places.
Yes. I heard that a lot of pet ferrets in the US are really inbred, and they get lots of cancer. I didn’t catch the name of the suppliers.
BTW, if you have a skunk or a raccoon in WV with out a permit, the authorities will round them all up and give you a nice fine.
Which is fair.
If you can get a permit.
You can’t get a permit for wildlife rehabilitation in West Virginia.
http://www.homelandstupidity.us/2006/02/22/dont-save-the-wildlife/
And you can’t get a permit to have a skunk, a fox, or raccoon now, because of a rabies scare in the southeastern corner of the state. I happen to live in a rabies free (or at least “rabies rare”) corridor, as in they have heavily baited the land with vaccines, which are dropped from the planes.
This was when I was living up in rural northwestern Ohio. The drugs in the area are more of a concern than a few skunks and foxes, all of which are kept in safely enclosed areas and leashed when outside the fence. The lady laughed when she told me about how the dog warden got the most calls from her when she walked her striped skunk in front of her house, but people would generally not bother her when she had her other ones outside. The foxes (a red and an arctic) mostly were just kept inside a garage and let out in a fenced yard to play with the family’s German Shepherds.
I once went to Bucyrus to get some phezes. That part of the state looks nothing like what I’m used to.
My grandfather and dad and uncle once made a lot of money trapping and shoot foxes when their fur was of some value.
But you can keep a Bengal tiger or a fennec without a permit– not native wildlife, no problem!
BTW, there is no “Martinsville, West Virginia.”
There is a New Martinsville, which downriver from Wheeling.
With fall here in Canada, we’ve been getting a lot of skunks trolling the area…looking for some chow to keep them through the winter. Many of our clients have been telling us their dogs have been ‘skunked’ of late. The baking soda/peroxide/soap recipe really works…way better than the tomato juice, or many of those other ‘de-skunking’ products avail at the pet stores. We were impressed how quickly it got the odour out, and our clients said the same thing.
It’s amazing how many dogs want to go right up to the skunk and say hi…well, maybe not in that ‘friendly, how are ya’ way, but either out of curiosity or just simply to chase them down…I wonder how many ‘skunked’ dogs learn their lesson? ‘Hey watch out for those stripey ones, they reek!’ ;)
that was a cute video, man there are some talented skunks out there!! (nice to see them do something more exciting than just raise their tails)