A little more on skunks. Back in late February, I drove to a writers’ meeting in Branson. Pat and I counted skunks freshly ran over. We counted over 20 and decided that was one per every five miles. Now, I made no effort to see if they were male or female. But that was the season for them being on the highway, mating time in the world of skunks – males are like tom cats, they’ll mate with as many females as they can find.
Several types of skunks exist. They used to think they belonged to the weasel family, but since then scientists have sorted them out as a species by themselves. East of Springdale and over in Madison County, I have seen a variation in the color pattern in skunks. Some are white where others are black with the traditional white stripe. These are about all white at first glance, but have some black on them.
They have few enemies besides cars and dogs who are stupid enough to get sprayed. I have owned a few dumb dogs. The only animal that preys on skunks is the owl. An owl does that because he has no sense of smell.
Skunks can be a source of rabies, and any time you see one acting strange, beware. Also a skunk that is out roaming around in the daylight should be closely watched.
Pat and I live at the end of a country lane. We came home one night late and when we turned off the county road there she was with her family of six babies. The lane is narrow and the grass was high on both sides. So we had to go a quarter mile behind them at baby skunk speed because the grass was tall along the sides and she would not leave the road herding them. I thought we’d never get home with my wife saying, “Oh, oh, you’re getting too close.”
When my two girls were in grade school, our beagle hound had a fit outside one night. “Dad, Dad,” they shouted. “Alvin is fighting with a bear.” I jumped up with my .22 and ran outside and tried to get a shot at the dang thing. It had run to the crawl space door on the side of the house where not a bear, but a skunk, was having a fight with the dog. I couldn’t shoot for fear of hitting my dog.
He finally got enough and I dispatched the skunk. But when I went back inside, assuring them it was only a skunk, the furnace came on and the air induction sucked all that odor in the house and the girls had a fit, saying how they couldn’t sleep smelling that critter, we should go to a motel for the night, etc. But we lived through it.
This wasn’t my first experience with a skunk. At The Alpha Gamma Rho fraternity house at Arizona State University, where I lived going to college, one of the guys got a deodorized skunk. Bought it or won it in a card game, I’m not sure, but we kept her in a rabbit cage and fed it dog food. Oh, we would take it to dances and parties and turn it loose when we came in the door, making women scream and men run for cover. Very hilarious. She was nice-natured, and tame as a house cat. She even liked to be petted.
Somehow she got out of the cage and there was a fraternity meeting held. We needed to find Flower, as she was called, because we learned that many of the university girls were fascinated with her. When we took her along it was a good way to break in on socializing with some pretty girl. So we were organized to go with flashlights at night and look all around the neighborhood and reclaim our sweet-smelling Flower. We gave everyone a block to work, and we went in groups of three. Armed with fish nets and bug nets from the entomology lab, these determined future ag experts roamed Tempe, Ariz., like a posse from the old west.
Then I heard John Hadlock, who is veterinarian now at Quartzsite, Ariz., yell, “I found Flower!” His loud voice carried several blocks and we all took a breath of relief. Next came, “Hell, no! It ain’t Flower!” Excuse the expletive, but that ended the pungent search for our long-lost pet.
Western novelist Dusty Richards and his wife Pat live on Beaver Lake in northwest Arkansas. For more information about his books you can email Dusty by visiting www.ozarksfn.com and clicking on ‘Contact Us’ or call 1-866-532-1960.
