A memory of jitterbug perfume

A saw my first live spotted skunk in the middle of highway 45 in Chihuahua, Mexico in August,1965.

Highway 45 was a two lane road at the time, and for all I know it may still be.

It was a strange vision on a lonely road in the middle of the night.

In the headlights of our WW2 Dodge Power Wagon it looked like a powder puff doing the jitterbug.

As we slowed down we saw that a very animated spotted skunk was trying to catch a large moth on the asphalt.

It was an enchanting sight I never forgot.

I still find these spunky little guys to be real charmers, so here are a couple shots from a recent camera trap set in Butte Creek Canyon.

Defiance in black and white

Nov 17, 2010, 6:12PM

If not trigger happy skunks certainly are quick on the draw.

The majority of my countless skunk photos are of peaceful citizens mindlessly ambling about in the darkness while sniffing and scratching for grubs.

Occasionally however they notice the camera trap's lens movement.

Then they raise the white flag of warning.

That's as far as it goes.

It usually takes a clear and present danger to set off a skunk, and as far as I know no skunk has found a camera trap sufficiently threatening to drop the bomb.

Gun fighters shouldn't waste ammo.

I didn't give much thought to the portrait of the defiant Stinkerella below -- the handstand, hind feet ajar, and all that --  I'd seen it before,

Dec 30, 12:30 AM

but then I saw Randon Truth's excellent photo of another hand-standing Stinkerella.

Its warning flag was fully flared. My Stinkerella's tail was as tight as a shaving brush.

The difference made me wonder.

Was it just a chance difference, or is there more to it than that?

Can you predict the spotted skunk's readiness to cut loose by the flare of the hair of its tail?

Does the spotted skunk furl its flag before dropping the bomb?

Why not? Wouldn't pissing your tail be like shooting yourself in the foot?

I decided to ask my colleague Galen Rathbun, who once had a pet spotted skunk about the tail business. 

Here's what he said . . .

"I had a Spilogale and kept it in a large rabbit hutch behind the house.

I could take it out but since it wasn't de-scented I never took it into the house.

My mom was very tolerant of my various and numerous critters, but she wasn't that tolerant.

I was going to College of San Mateo at the time, on the old Coyote Point campus, and on several occasions I put the skunk in the cab of my Chevy pickup for the drive from Woodside to Coyote Point.

It was in its nest box, but was able to run about in the cab while I was in class.

It only happened once.

It let loose in the truck while I was in class.

I don't know why it happened, but suspect some student saw the skunk and harrassed it from outside.

Anyway, I had to drive my pickup with all the windows open for quite a while.

If this had happened in the house, I might have become homeless when such a lifestyle was pretty rare."

So Stinkerella's furled flag of defiance remains a mystery.

And if any of you are wondering why anyone in their right mind would take an intact skunk to school in their pickup truck, well, you just haven't known many zoologists. 

Chimineas Stinkarella found at last

Finding Stinkarella the spotted skunk was one of the surprises from the last Chimineas trip.

It took 15 months to find the pert skunk on a rocky promontory east of San Juan Creek in a thicket of chamise and manzanita.

I know where to find these little charmers up here in the foothills, but we had to scour the literature to get a better idea of their habitat associations in more arid regions.

The secret is to look for them in dense cover.

They are not habitat generalists like striped skunks, and tend to stick to thickets.

The little guy showed up for single photo ops 3 times the first week, and once on the 5th and 6th weeks.

It was one of two carnivores photographed at this set.

A striped skunk also showed.

These are classy little predators and I never get tired of them.

Reference

Neiswenter, S. A.  and R. C. Dowler. 2007. Habitat Use of Western Spotted Skunks and Striped Skunks in Texas. The Journal of Wildlife Management, 71(2):583-586.