Kind of … I’m Indigenous Canadian and one of the lessons my hunter/trapper father taught me was to respect all animal life, no matter what it is. He taught us that no one should kill any animal unless it was to feed ourselves or use it for our survival. You don’t just kill something for nothing.
So when I started driving on highways just over 30 years ago, I’d be a good person and clean up dead animals on the road. I thought it was disrespectful for people to just run over animals until it turned into an organic pancake. But it was constant and just about every drive I took meant I had to clean up something and most times, my passengers didn’t appreciate it. Once I picked up a skunk that had been knocked dead … hit in the head but not squished. I was careful and put it in a garbage bag and threw behind my half ton truck and drove it away to put in the woods somewhere. I stopped not far, picked up the bag and it burst … INSIDE MY TRUCK BED!!! … the skunk had ‘leaked’ or its glands had burst or let go or something and a bit of juice came out of the bag … I just about gagged and ran away. It took me a month to get rid of that smell and no one wanted to ride with me.
The smell is so strong when you are that close that it will add a stench to your clothes that will take about 20 washes to remove the scent.
Wow that’s interesting and the conclusion is so terrible! I have been close to dead skunks and had dogs sprayed by them and it was so rank at a distance. The worst story I heard (before now) was from someone who let their dog outside and the dog went and got sprayed by a skunk then came inside and jumped into the bed. That destroyed that guy for like a month. He couldn’t go to work for a while even.
The worst I ever heard was a friend of mine who lived not far from Toronto. This was way back in the 80s when living half an hour from the downtown still meant you were close to a lot of wildlife. He had a husky dog and sometimes when friends came over, the dog was too young and hyperactive to be inside with other people, he’d keep the dog in a large rear porch for a while. During one such visit, him and his friend heard the dog yelp and bark and make sounds like he were talking to someone. They thought they had another visitor. The dog went silent, then let out a yelp and howl like crazy. They ran into the back porch thinking someone did something to their dog.
They saw the skunk squeeze into a crack in the wall and then the over powering stench hit them. They couldn’t stay and ran away outside with the dog who was in pain and howling and whimpering. In the rush, they left the inside door open for an hour without thinking … it stank up the house for months.
This is an old family friend and I was a kid when we went to visit them that summer and you could still smell the lingering scent of sweet musk everywhere.
He said he soaked the dog in tomato juice and bathed it twice a week for a month before they got back to some normal.
It’s not bad if you can smell skunk in the outdoors because it quickly dissipates… but if the spray and scent get trapped inside a house or building, it takes a lot more effort to get rid of.
Kind of … I’m Indigenous Canadian and one of the lessons my hunter/trapper father taught me was to respect all animal life, no matter what it is. He taught us that no one should kill any animal unless it was to feed ourselves or use it for our survival. You don’t just kill something for nothing.
So when I started driving on highways just over 30 years ago, I’d be a good person and clean up dead animals on the road. I thought it was disrespectful for people to just run over animals until it turned into an organic pancake. But it was constant and just about every drive I took meant I had to clean up something and most times, my passengers didn’t appreciate it. Once I picked up a skunk that had been knocked dead … hit in the head but not squished. I was careful and put it in a garbage bag and threw behind my half ton truck and drove it away to put in the woods somewhere. I stopped not far, picked up the bag and it burst … INSIDE MY TRUCK BED!!! … the skunk had ‘leaked’ or its glands had burst or let go or something and a bit of juice came out of the bag … I just about gagged and ran away. It took me a month to get rid of that smell and no one wanted to ride with me.
The smell is so strong when you are that close that it will add a stench to your clothes that will take about 20 washes to remove the scent.
Wow that’s interesting and the conclusion is so terrible! I have been close to dead skunks and had dogs sprayed by them and it was so rank at a distance. The worst story I heard (before now) was from someone who let their dog outside and the dog went and got sprayed by a skunk then came inside and jumped into the bed. That destroyed that guy for like a month. He couldn’t go to work for a while even.
The worst I ever heard was a friend of mine who lived not far from Toronto. This was way back in the 80s when living half an hour from the downtown still meant you were close to a lot of wildlife. He had a husky dog and sometimes when friends came over, the dog was too young and hyperactive to be inside with other people, he’d keep the dog in a large rear porch for a while. During one such visit, him and his friend heard the dog yelp and bark and make sounds like he were talking to someone. They thought they had another visitor. The dog went silent, then let out a yelp and howl like crazy. They ran into the back porch thinking someone did something to their dog.
They saw the skunk squeeze into a crack in the wall and then the over powering stench hit them. They couldn’t stay and ran away outside with the dog who was in pain and howling and whimpering. In the rush, they left the inside door open for an hour without thinking … it stank up the house for months.
This is an old family friend and I was a kid when we went to visit them that summer and you could still smell the lingering scent of sweet musk everywhere.
He said he soaked the dog in tomato juice and bathed it twice a week for a month before they got back to some normal.
It’s not bad if you can smell skunk in the outdoors because it quickly dissipates… but if the spray and scent get trapped inside a house or building, it takes a lot more effort to get rid of.
holy crap, yeah that is horrible!