One of the fondest memories I have was of the three baby skunks that my brother brought home one summer. He had accidently run over their mother when he was tending to the fields and they would have died if he’d left them there. So three tiny polecats joined our household.
As was usual with the wild animals that were brought home, Ma fed them bread and milk and they freely roamed the house and yard as they wished. These three little black and white monsters were great fun to watch. We had a litter of kittens about the same age as the skunks and they were typically found either wrestling or sleeping in a pile together.
As I mentioned, the skunks had free reign of the house with the exception of when we went to town. Since the baby skunks had the instinct to turn and threaten with their little tails raised in warning, well before they were able to spray, Ma would use a broom to push them out the door. The skunks were always very disgusted with these mini-evictions. I never really understood the purpose of it, everytime we returned from town all three would have already found a way back into the house.
Naturally, as they got a little older, they were developing the ability to spray. At first it didn’t have a strong odor, but as with most animals, they matured pretty fast. With spraying being their only defense, they used it without hesitation.
One day we were going to a party and it was time to shoo the three skunks out the door. Ma was usually pretty good about blocking their little butts so they couldn’t spray her directly, but the one little polecat was adamant that he wasn’t going out the door on this day. Of course, the moment you’re in a hurry Murphey’s Law automatically kicks in. I think the skunk had been practicing so that he could aim around the broom in order to get Ma, and thereby let her know what he thought of being pushed out the door. In short, Ma was dressed to leave for a party and the skunk sprayed her dress pants. I haven’t seen Ma REALLY mad too many times, but this was right up there. It’s a wonder we didn’t have fried skunk that night. Almost magically the broom disappeared and was replaced by a can of Lysol. Ma was chasing the skunk, “Spray me will you! Let’s see how YOU like it!” I’ve never seen Ma run so fast. They made two or three rounds through the house before the skunk dashed out the door to safety.
Somehow, we ended up picking up a white kitten that was going to go to my sister’s house. The kitten was very shy and hid behind everything it could. It was time to take the kitten to my sister and of course we couldn’t find it. By process of elimination, Pa figured it was behind the huge chest freezer in the kitchen. He took the broom and in his normal, less than gentle way, started prodding under the freezer. “Yep, there’s something solid under there!” Seconds later, a very strong odor curled all of our noses and a mad dash was made outside.
Shortly after that, it was decided that the skunks were old enough to fend for themselves and, like the ornery woodchuck, they weren’t going to leave on their own.
The skunks were collected up and taken to the top of the property to join the ornery woodchuck, but like the woodchuck, they returned home – refusing to accept their eviction notice. It took a few more tries, but these little monsters were having none of it. They liked living with us and that was that. Ma wasn’t having it – they’d pointed their stinky little butts at her way too many times for them to be permitted to stay.
We were just done with haying where the new thruway was going to be laid (don’t worry, it didn’t go in for another 10 years or so), so the three mature polecats were permanently evicted.
To this day, I think skunks are awesome… minus the smell.
