Small Skunk, Big Victory

       
It had been ten days since I first saw the skunk, since Curtis first charged it and was stopped in his tracks by the horror in my voice. Each afternoon at 5 sharp, the little animal had trundled into the yard (usually from a different direction each time, telling me she had us on a route) and happily eaten a small bowl of Fromm's kibble. I'd kept Curtis inside at that hour, because who needs to tempt fate? I had no idea if the lesson of that memorable day had taken in his brain. I'm still getting to know him, and I have enormous respect for the power of his prey drive, the instinct bred into him to go for the kill.

The skunk and I had fallen into a routine. She responded to my voice by advancing toward me, not retreating. I could walk right past her and set her bowl down and she'd bumble like a stumbly kitten to the goods.  Charmingly myopic, she followed the scent of the food and seemed unperturbed by my watching and photographing her as she ate.

She was moving better, but she still had to hop with that broken hind leg. She would never win a race. A skunk doesn't have to be fast. All it really has to be is black and white, and armed.

It's funny how fast I can get attached to something like a crippled skunk. All I have to feel is that I'm somehow helping it, and I'm gone, all in. 

To be fair to me, she is absolutely adorable. Not the fanciest, by any means, but the cutest for sure.

After ten days of this, I felt I knew how she'd react, and finally felt comfortable doing another experiment with Curtis. I put his leash on and walked quietly out into the yard while the skunk was about. Watch what happened next!

               

I think you can hear how pleased I am that our dog has finally had a change of heart and mind about skunks. Because his hunting instinct is so powerful, I honestly never thought I'd see the day. That makes the gift of his cooperation all the more wonderful. I have the feeling this lesson will hold, on or off the lead. I think he's put it all together that Ma wants him to stay away from skunks. What a good boy!

As I write, it's March 20, and she's been here a solid two weeks. I hurried to set her kibble out this evening at 5 pm, as always. For the first time, she didn't show up. Aww, heck. Doggone it. Now what? Was she in a burrow somewhere, giving birth to tiny kits, broken leg and all? Had a great horned owl grabbed her? I hadn't smelled a struggle... Had she just changed her route, or found a carcass somewhere to feast on?

With wild friends, this time may be the last you'll ever see them, but each one I come to know, no matter how inconvenient or smelly they may be, is a gift. This little skunk stayed long enough to teach Curtis how to live with his neighbors. She was kind and patient and grateful, and those are good things to have in a friend. Here's hoping we see her again, farther on down the line.

Wait. There's more. 

Update: The compost area was heavily anointed with skunk aroma around 11 Friday night.  And the skunk was back at 3:45 pm on Saturday, March 21, hinting broadly that it was time for her kibble.  Being well-trained, I obliged. 

Sunday, March 22: She spent a couple hours in the compost pit from 3 pm on, sorting through some meat scraps that found their way in. Ignored her kibble. 

 This is her I-don't-want-to-talk-to-you-right-now glare. My kids, who are both in residence with me, eating like kings and sucking down every drop of bandwidth until such time as the world stops ending, are making fun of me as per usual.  Now, because of how obsessed I am with "that crippled skunk." 

Her name is SugarBean.

 That is all from Indigo Hill. 

Fun With Skunks and Dogs

I first saw her March 7, moving slowly, even for a skunk, across the sideyard. It took only seconds for me to realize that something was wrong. She was injured, probably with a broken left hind leg. The instinctive helper in me was instantly and permanently sad. There's really little way that I can think of to help an injured skunk, without getting yourself permeated with its noxious scent for the next few months.

Oh, it was so hard to watch her hobbling along. Try as I might, I couldn't think of a way to capture and hold her to get her into care, without rendering myself unspeakably smelly. I know of someone who recently tried; valiant Deb caught an injured skunk and took it in her car to a rehab facility, but even there, people were utterly amazed that she'd do that. She and her car got good and sprayed for her kindness, too. I love skunks, but even I don't love them enough to be willing to do that.

You can see the unnatural arch of her back that says she's favoring the near hind leg.

I've been continuously living with this stench, both intense and faint,  ever since Curtis Loew came into my life, and I can tell you that it's not something I'd willingly invite by trying to handle a wild skunk. As of his last event in January 2020, he'd been sprayed three times in 11 months. The events were evenly enough spaced that juuust as he was starting to smell like potting soil and sunshine again, he'd go and get himself doused. It has been thoroughly discouraging. How can such a smart dog be so durn dumb about skunks? Is a fondness for playing with mustelids one of the many traits that got him surrendered by his former owners? I would bet so. In all his nearly twelve years, Chet Baker got sprayed twice. The first time was his fault (Ooh! Look at the kitty! Does it want to play?) The second was a complete accident (taking a 10:30 pm mad walk, we both tripped over a skunk in the pitch dark). And after that episode, when Chet saw a skunk, he'd immediately sit down, clear his throat, watch with great interest, and refuse to go any closer. He was not slow. Neither is Curtis; in fact in many ways Curtis is more clever than Chet. But he's also a cur, bred to hunt, and therein lies the problem.

 I heard Curtis one morning in the third week of January 2020, deep in our west woods, giving an angry, commanding bark. I didn't  like the sound of that bark. It sounded like he had something cornered, low; his treed animal bark is higher and more yelpy. And it wasn't too long before he came lolloping up the meadow, long strings of foamy slobber coating his head and chest. He'd stop to roll, then keep running toward home. What the heck did you get into? Oh. OH. OHHHH. Crap!! Not again!!

By this third time that he'd pulled this, I'd figured out how to handle it, and I told him he was NOT coming in the house. No, I left him outside while I prepared a bucket of hydrogen peroxide, baking soda and dishwashing liquid.  Here's the recipe:

• 1 quart of 3% hydrogen peroxide 
• 1/4 cup baking soda
• 1 teaspoon liquid dishwashing soap

 I gloved myself,  leashed him, and made him stand on the sidewalk while I lathered him up, three times in a row. It was absolutely miserable for us both. Only when I got him to where I could stand to be near him did I carry him straight to the downstairs tub for more peroxide rinses and then a real hot bath. I did not allow him inside to jump up on furniture or rub himself on the carpet, all of which he did in the two previous episodes, anointing my house with a stench that lasted weeks. DisGUSting.

Far as I knew, I had a dog who was never going to learn about skunks. I realized that, in Curtis, I had a macho-a-s dog who thought it was worth it to get sprayed, if he could just get the right grip on that funny little animal. The first time, he'd rushed a skunk as the kids walked him out the meadow.  A good spraying ensued.  I had the opportunity to test him on a long lead not long afterward. I spotted a skunk feeding in a distant meadow and walked him obliquely toward it, leash slack, without saying a word. (This was a test.  Everything is an experiment). He spotted it, went on alert, stalked it (not a good sign) then, forgetting he was on lead, bolted toward it. I was only too happy to bring him up with the leash and give him a good scolding. You idiot! Unreformed, clearly, and utterly unrepentant. You want me to hunt, right??

 In our next encounter, he was walking at twilight ON A SHORT LEASH with ME HOLDING IT and Shila right beside us when he dove into a ditch and came up twirling around in a circle with a SKUNK in his JAWS. That time was extra special. There was so much screaming!  Shila and I still laugh our heads off when we talk about it. Spinning! Screaming! Cussing! A real stinky ride home in my car! Which stank for weeks! And in this fourth encounter, he'd cornered one deep in the woods and taken it right in the kisser. NOT LEARNING. Not even CLOSE. Some might call him an idiot. I knew it was something closer to invincibility, stubborn, butt-headed courage. It was worth it to him, for the thrill of the hunt. And this was bad.

And now I had a badly injured skunk right smack in my yard who couldn't go anywhere fast. Great. I could see this was not going to end well. A lot of people would have solved the problem with a bullet in the skunk. I am not like a lot of people. I prefer to lead a more interesting life than that.

Watching the little animal, I decided it was probably a female, since it was the smallest adult skunk I'd seen. I could also tell the injury was recent, and painful. I suspected she had been hit by a car, since both legs on her left side seemed to be affected. I don't think Curtis could have done it, because the last time he was sprayed was back in January, and here it was March 7. And he certainly would have been sprayed for his efforts had he grabbed her and injured her.

Over the next few days, that skunk showed up in the compost area every day at 5 pm. OK, for now the plan was to keep Curtis inside in the late afternoon. It was a plan that could work in the short term, but it was only a matter of time before Curtis would stumble across her. I dreaded that, but all the same I was fascinated by her, and the way she was learning to compensate for her injuries. She seemed to move just a little better with each passing day. I hatched a plan to support her with food until she could get around better. I suspect that most people would think that was dumb. Even I thought it was about 85% dumb. But I couldn't help myself.

 It started innocently enough. She was rooting around in the compost pile, and I went over and picked up a window-killed cardinal that I had laid out for the sharp-shinned hawk who got robbed by a bobcat in my last blogpost. The sharpie had eyed the dead bird but never took me up on the offer. He is a grown male, perfectly capable of catching fresh food. Sharpies are not scavengers, like their phlegmatic buteo cousins. They're finicky hawk royalty. The cardinal had been lying in freezing temperatures for three days, was still good, and I figured the hurt skunk could use the protein. So I crept as close to the compost pit as I dared, lobbed the bird in a high arc and brought it to a perfect landing about 6" from the skunk's head. The skunk jumped comically, looked around, followed her nose, and immediately dug in. She ate the cardinal's head, crunching down its massive beak with impressive power. I cannot imagine swallowing a cardinal's beak, but she did it. (Maybe I'll find that poop!)  Then she picked the bird up and carried it into a trumpetvine tangle to finish her excellent meal.

I don't have photos of all that happened the next time I saw the skunk. It was a couple days later: Monday, March 9, a beautiful warm afternoon, and I had the windows thrown open to air the house out. I was in the studio,  washing the floor, and it suddenly occurred to me that the skunk ought to be in the yard about now. I looked outside and the first thing I saw was Curtis, moseying slowly across the side yard. Ut-oh. He stopped for a pee. I scanned the yard. His head came up, ears pricked, and he went tense. I followed his gaze to the innocent little skunk, bumbling toward the compost pit maybe 100' away.

Like an arrow shot from a crossbow, Curtis launched himself at the animal. And just as quickly, I hollered NO!! NO!!  NONONONONONONO CURTIS NO NONONONONO!!

Because the windows were open, Curtis heard me, picked up on the anguish in my voice. For once, he did not go selectively deaf, as he has so many times when I've tried to turn him off a scent. And that dog stopped in his tracks. Turned. Tucked his tail and groveled up to me (By then, I'd thrown myself out the front door and was headed out to get sprayed, too). The skunk stood her ground. She hadn't even lifted her tail. Curtis was at my feet, miraculously odorless and thoroughly chastised. Most amazing, he was saying he was sorry. Who are you, and what have you done with my bone-headed huntin' dog??

A miracle had occurred. To me, it was on the same scale as Moses parting the waters or a nun in a cinnamon bun. I had somehow called a thick-headed mountain cur with a prey drive the size of Nebraska off the easiest prey he'd ever get to grab. It all spoke to the immense value of offering a firm correction at the very moment it is needed. Which is exactly at the moment the dog is doing the stupid thing. Not before. Not after. 

At. That. Moment. 

I praised Curtis, laughing and crying at the same time. He sheepishly accepted my hugs, then slunk off toward the front door. I tried to call him to me, so we could go a bit closer, look at the skunk together and talk about why we don't mess with skunks. He was having none of my yammer. He was done with that scene. 

Score one for the skunk! One for Curtis Loew! Score a huge one for Zick!

Slow clap for the dog.

I was so pathetically grateful to the skunk for holding her fire that I put GoodBoy Curtis inside and fetched a handful of his kibble to throw to her. In this video, she's gladly vacuuming up my offering. Yep, 85% dumb, and 100% grateful, that's me. There's just something about skunks that I adore, and no amount of inconvenience and discomfort that they cause can change that. My heart surged with hope that, against all odds and Curtis' inborn ways, we had finally found a way to coexist.

                

You know there's more to the story. There's always more.

Like a Cat in the Woods

March 2, 2020, couldn't be any more different than March 2 of 2019. Last year, today was a Sunday, and Wendy and I were hosting the biggest birthday music party we could humanly pull off, for Bill. We all knew it would be the last birthday he'd have, and we wanted it to be the best one. And it was. Beloved musicians drove and flew from all over and that man played as if he were possessed, all day and into the night. He said it had been the best day of his life. Now, Bill was given to hyperbole, but we knew he meant it, and that it was true. And why not? His favorite friends were there, playing his favorite music, and everybody was freely showing their love for him. He was playing like the devil had gotten into him. And, of course, it had.

He was on fire, inside and out, and it was beautiful and sweet and terrible to see. Music was his reason for living, and man, did he live all that day, that wonderful day. I'll never forget what he said later, recalling that day. "I swear, I could go, and if there was gonna be music, I'd rise up and play another twelve hours. It means that much to me."

Today was different. It was quiet and cool and drizzly and there was nobody here but me and Curtis. I was thinking about him off and on, thinking about his birthday tomorrow, wondering how to mark it.

The cardinals pippering, the doves rocketing, the goldfinches careening, the yard exploding. A dark blue bullet swooped in, doing an elaborate loop-de-loop with a bird practically as large as he. Though their forms were no more than blurs, I knew it had to be a tiny male sharp-shin chasing a mourning dove. They climbed higher and higher, and the dove turned over in flight and stooped toward the ground, and the sharpie threw out one foot and snagged it like a cocklebur snags your sleeve. And they both tumbled to the ground, head over tail, and everything went silent. 

I grabbed my binoculars and my big camera and slipped downstairs and out the sliding door. I peeped over a rise and there he was, glorious, mantling over the captive dove. A full adult male sharp-shinned hawk, a damned rare bird any more. Oh joy. He will eat today. Much as I love mourning doves, having been mama to three, I wanted this hawk to eat today.

He wanted to fly away, but he couldn't, because he had to kill the dove first. I took two shots and retreated the way I'd come, head down, showing him I meant no harm, that I'd leave him in peace to finish the job. No photo was worth spooking him off his hard-won meal. The thing to do in this delicate situation is to get out of there.

Once inside, I raced up three flights of stairs to the birdwatching tower. The windows were streaked with rain, and I had to shoot at a terrible angle through two panes and rain too, but it was worth it to leave the little hawk in peace.

It may look like he's just loitering around, but he's squeezing that dove for all he's worth. Killing  takes more time than you'd think.

As soon as the dove was subdued, the little hawk tried to take off with it. And it was clear that this was not going to happen. A mourning dove weighs around 4.2 oz. A sharp-shinned hawk weighs around 5 oz. FIVE OUNCES. How does it cram so much fire and life into five ounces of flesh, bone, feather and nerve? Barely, that's how. Sharpies are all fire, all nerve.

Time and again the hawk tried to move his prey, and succeded only in making a couple of feet of headway. It wasn't clear the dove was dead yet, anyway.

 Ack. Are the doves' eyes open? Yep. Hard to watch, but watch I must.

It was interesting to see the predator suddenly vulnerable, now re-cast as prey. The sharpie desperately wanted to get into cover with its catch, knowing that he could himself fall prey out in the open. All it would take would be a passing Cooper's hawk, and he could lose both the dove and his life.

It was an impasse. I was settling in to watch him take his meal from the tower window, hoping he could pull it off without being attacked himself.

Suddenly, the sharpie took off, leaving the dove behind. What the heck? I followed him with my lens to the lone Virginia pine in the backyard.

There he sat and craned his neck, looking concerned. Instinct swung my lens back to where the dove lay.

And I saw with unbelieving eyes the tawny brown reason the sharpie had spooked.

The cat approached softly, stalking, unsure that the dove was really dead. Cats are careful. Cats are not rash.

And when it bent to take the bird in its jaws, the dove's wings stretched out in a last convulsion, a farewell to everything. Almost tenderly, the bobcat gathered the bird up.

Every cat owner has seen their pet with this look on its face. This is mine. Nobody had better try to take it from me.

The beautiful thief glanced around, the dove that had seemed so huge and unwieldy to its original captor, now but a trifle in its jaws.

Mixed emotions, the order of the day. I was heartbroken to see the sharp-shin robbed of such a fine meal, a meal for days. And I was absolutely thrilled to see a bobcat in my yard once again. I hadn't seen one in the yard since Curtis came on the scene. I was delighted to think that bobcats still stalked the margins, watched the feeder action. (And I had just been wondering this morning where the Norway rat who'd suddenly shown up had gone to.) I marveled that the cat came in, likely having seen me out in the yard just minutes earlier. And yet it did. I marveled at everything. I wondered who had sent these incredible things to me. The show goes on, and somehow I'd been here for it.

It turned, as cats will, on a soft pivot

and solemnly bore the dove away for good.

The cat simply melted into the woods and vanished. I have gone through my many bobcat photos but I can't say I recognize this animal.

It was just a bobcat, on a cool drizzly day in March, a day that was much different than this day one year ago. A day for reflection, for grief, for missing someone so special.

How I wish he were still here to see this, to see us. I still don't understand why he had to leave.

But he has melted away, like a cat in the rain-wet woods.

The sharp-shin bent to pick the feathers off his feet, wiped his bill on the pine branch, and flew off down the orchard.

He made another pass at the feeders just before it got too dark to see, but he didn't catch anything.