i cannot believe i used to love skunks! this morning i found 3 foxgloves and 2 freshly planted tomatoes dug up. oh the carnage and the sadness. the intrepid watchdog, after having been sprayed 3 or 4 times, has decided that she will have nothing to do with a skunk (she is smart, i can't blame her!). so i have ordered the mountain lion noisemaker that supposedly will keep them away, hopefully that will work. for the week or so until it gets here, does anyone have any suggestions for how to keep those cute and furry and oh so destructive skunks away??!!
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California
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Re: skunks!
Tue, April 29, 2008 - 11:44 AMuh...
Trap them and move them?
Or the ever effective, hire an exterminator?
We had a skunk over population at our farm, they were spraying horses, cows and sheep... dogs too. Eating chickens.
we had to " take care of them"
It wasnt safe for my kids to play outside...
we removed about 12 skunks that year. on a 10 acre parcle of land. -
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Re: skunks!
Tue, April 29, 2008 - 7:13 PMBig Live traps work great as they aren't afraid of much and will go right in. You can get one at any farm supply type store, or probably a big hardware store. Use anything a cat would eat as bait. If you want to let them go, approach the trap with a blanket very slowly and calmly. Hold the blanket in front of you so that if they spray it'll hit the blanket. Hopefully they won't and you can set the blanket over the trap. Once you do that they usually won't spray, but then you have to figure out if it's worth the risk to transport them and how to let them go. You can drown them in the trap. Drowning is cruel, but some people will go to extremes not to get their hands dirty so to speak. Better to shoot them. If you shoot them straight in the head they often won't spray. They are edible and the fur is nice. If you don't eat meat, feed them to your dogs, they gotta eat something. -
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Re: skunks!
Wed, April 30, 2008 - 1:11 PMok, full disclosure, i guess i wasn't looking for a "permanent solution," just a way to repel them. thank you though. i was a bit upset when i posted, have since calmed down and accepted the facts of the matter. we are not really dealing with a full infestation, just one guy who comes by every few weeks. he's not really trying to dig up the garden, just get a few worms for dinner... and he has stayed out of the chicken house for 6 months now!... so i will not try to exterminate him, he's almost an old friend. almost.
i do really appreciate the suggestions, and will do the trap thing if it ever becomes a really big problem. one question- how do you keep cats out? our neighbors, who just happen to be our landlords, have like 20 cats, and i would hate to go through the whole trap setting routine only to find a different cat in there every night... though i guess the dog does her job with them...
interesting about skunk meat... one more bit of knowledge for the preparedness brain file... -
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Re: skunks!
Wed, April 30, 2008 - 4:03 PMHonestly, I wouldn't feed your dog skunk meat unless a) you freeze it first to kill any parasites, and b) you're positive it doesn't have any diseases, esp. rabies.
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Re: skunks!
Wed, April 30, 2008 - 9:09 PMmaria it is far worse to find a skunk in your trap than a cat. a cat you can release without getting ... well, skunked.
those predator urines are total bullshit as far as my experience goes with them - but the scarecrow sprayer works really really well. -
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Re: skunks!
Thu, May 1, 2008 - 7:31 AMWe've had fantastic luck with the predator urine.
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Re: skunks!
Wed, April 30, 2008 - 4:00 PMTwo words....Bobcat Urine. Coyote urine can work too. You can usually pick it up at garden/farm supply stores or a hunting store (don't forget online either). Just put some in jars and place around the yard. That should work.
If the moutain lion thing doesn't do the trick get a Scarecrow. No, not the big stuffed doll. It's an impact sprayer that's up on a stake. It has a motion detector on it, and when it senses movement it shoots out water for about 3 seconds. It's loud and can startle you. You can also set the sensitivity. They aren't cheap but TOTALLY worth it. We had a problem with our dogs digging in the garden beds instead of their designated digging spot. It only took about 2 days for them to figure it out. www.critter-repellent.com/conte...r.html -
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Re: skunks!
Thu, May 1, 2008 - 12:38 AMLiving in possum, coon and skunk country (all of which sometimes dig in the garden) I've had to trap a fair number of our furry friends/enemies. Usually though, they come in a few nights dig up a couple of things and are then gone for a long time.
I wouldn't feed raw skunk meat to a dog, although they could probably handle it, but cooking kills all that stuff.
The sprinkler thing reminds me that I just met some guy who says he uses an auto sprinkler system with a motion detector to keep racoons out of his goldfish pond. Great idea! My garden is way to big for that though.
Good luck.
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