Skunk

Ole and Lena

Songster
8 Years
Jul 22, 2011
389
44
123
Wright Co Minnesota
Had an interesting meeting with PePe LePieu this evening. Went out to pick eggs, feed and water the birds and saw something strange in the corner of the coop. Took a second to comprehend, it was a skunk with his tail up, aiming at me!!!! Old camping training kicked in and I slowly backed out of the door, he didn't spray. Got the .22 but he was gone. Found where he dug to gain entrance to the barn, and tunneled under the coop wall (my coop is built into a corner of the barn). It's a young one, not fully grown yet. Didn't seem to harm any birds, but he was sucking an egg in the corner.

I've never trapped specifically for skunks before. I've caught them accidentally in fox/coon traps. Since my avid trapping days, I've traded off all my skunk sized connibears. Anybody ever catch them in 110 or 120s? I've only ever used this size in water sets for mink/muskrat. I do have suitable sized footholds, but that could get messy, and I don't want to ask the wife to shoot a skunk caught in a foothold. Either way the barn will stink, but better than having a skunk set up housekeeping. I'm sure he will eventually figure out how to kill chickens, and he's already conditioned to a free meal.
 
I trapped a skunk one time in a foot hold trap and because I had to be somewhere else I shot the skunk, pushed over the small coop the brood hen it killed was housed in and left with the dead skunk still hanging in the trap. The next morning when I returned the hens that was running loose on the chicken yard (about 200 of them) had eaten Mister Skunk, scent and all. I didn't notice any skunky smell or taste in my morning eggs either. The only evidence of the skunk that I found was tiny wisps of black or white fur and one small piece of white skull cap that both inside and out was as clean as a whistle.
 

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