Skunk Hunting... Anyone but me???

animalloverbutalsohunter

animalloverbutalsohunter

New member
I love going out at night and shooting skunks!! There is a continuous open season on them in VA and since i live on a farm, they are a blast to drive around at night with the spotlight and pop a few of them with the 17 hmr. I have killed 5 this week. 3 so far tonight.

I have found the biggest problem with them, is digging holes in our fields looking for grub worms. This doesnt seem like a problem to most people, but when you have approximately 10,000 holes in a single field, it can turn a field into a wash out if the rain is bad enough!

But i was wondering if anyone else had the strange hobby of hunting them?? Anyone in Central VA that has some land to hunt them? We can kinda go back and forth on properties... I live on 700 acres and the skunk population is very high!!! Thats what happens when you raise beans and corn.. The grubs come which brings the skunks!!

Andrew
 
sounds like fun

i kind of do the same thing with possums
we have way 2 many i know what ya mean
they r both jus lil pests

loads of fun isnt it
 
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In our area, I'm know as "skunk" because I've earned the title /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif. I use a .410 /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grinning-smiley-003.gif.
 
Sounds like a dream come true! I wish a had a place that I could shoot 'em like that!
To me, skunks are targets of oppurtunity and are shot all the time by me; day or night. I never thought of actually driving around looking for them to shoot.
Keep it up and keep having fun! Those little demons are Hell on waterfowl populations, not to mention farmland!
 
i use the same method for hunting jackrabbits in our ranch. i have seen several skunks while doing it, but not a lot, in many years of hunting. i always leave them alone. in fact i have never killed one. should i shoot them and help some farmer?? i feed the ranch's dogs with the jacks we kill, so i see no point in killing skunks nor possums, which i rarely see in the ranch. there arent a lot of skunks there, so i dont think they are a plague or something like that. thanx!
 
Mex3D,


If they arent over run then they prob arent a threat. But when you go out and see 5 to 10 a night and shoot 5 and still see the same number the next night, then it might be time to start taking care of some of them! But it always does help the farmers out if you kill some! I live beside a huge chicken farm that is an egg laying farm and the skunks LOVE to get in there and eat some eggs! Ive actually killed a few coming out of the houses!!! So, i guess it depends on the quanity of them!

Andrew
 
I hate it when I go out and see where skunks have dug up my lawn! They root around just like a pig will, only smaller!

I go out periodically with my MagLight and my short barreled 12 guage! They are usually shot at around 20 ft!

The secret is to get up-wind of them before you startle or shoot them!
Another tip: If you're shooting them around your yard, make sure that the house isn't down-wind when you pull the trigger or your wife won't be very happy with you!
 
I agree. Too many skunks are a real nuisance, in more ways than one! I bought a new farm about 3 years ago and it was overrun with skunks. To date, I have killed over 35 skunks off this property, which is 187 acres. Only 67 arces are wooded! I still don't know were they all come from. We are getting a thaw here in NW Ohio and the skunks have come out. I shot one yesterday, but that was just a target of opertunity while driving down a lonely back road.
 
My hunting partner and myself had decided one winter (1995/96) that it would be great if we had a couple skunk hides hanging on the wall at home. Thus started an adventure that was to test the limits of Emergency Room care at the local hospital and the resolve of our marriages.

This might be rather long but the whole odyssey from start to finish spanned several months and to not tell the whole tale would be disgracing the torment and physical anguish that we went through.

The first thing we had to do was get us a couple skunks. The trick to killing a skunk is to do it without him spraying. We ended up with three skunks.

SKUNK 1
I was trapping at the time and knew that sooner or later I would have a skunk in a trap. It was not long after the fateful decision to tan us some skunk hides that I found a skunk in a trap one morning on my trap line. Every time I approached him he acted mighty aggravated. I think he might have suspected what we had in store from him. I was afraid that he would spray if I got any closer and I was not close enough to give him a killing head shot with my pistol. (pre-Browning Buckmark). I had to therefore shoot him in the head with a rifle. Problem was the weeds were too tall for me to see the skunk when I backed away. I ended up standing in the bed of my pickup and leaning over the cab with a Marlin 39A with open sights. One shot from about 40 yards and I had me one big dead skunk. I walked over and was elated that I hit him in the head and he died without spraying. As I gleefully carried him back to my pickup with visions of tanned skunk hides on the wall I nonchalantly tossed him over the tailgate and into the pickup.

Bad mistake. When he hit the floor he let go every drop of the putrid, gagging liquid he had reserved for me. Now when I did this I was standing directly behind the tailgate. The tailgate that was made out of the diamond mesh steel sYep, I got sprayed from about 2 feet away. I puked and regained my composure. I thought maybe we could wash the stink out of him if we had to and decided to keep him. For lack of a better place to put him I wrapped him in plastic bags and buried him in the bottom of the chest freezer inside the back porch. Remember this for later.




SKUNK 2 and 3

It was colder than a well diggers butt and we knew all the critters would be holed up tight. We were coon hunting and were running the dogs inside abandoned farms houses and buildings. These old falling down places are favorites for coons to sleep out a cold snap.

Me and hunting partner #2 were in the basement of an old house. Hunting partner #2 did not approve of the skunk adventures. It would even be safe to say he thought we were crazy and was deathly afraid of skunks. The dogs were rooting around the old buildings and we were in the old house. We were looking in nooks and crannies for old Mr. Coon. There was a faint musky smell of skunk but it was not strong enough to get my hopes up. Nor was it strong enough to send my faint hearted hunting partner fleeing for his life. I looked under a chunk of concrete from the broken up floor and saw a patch of black with some white on it. Now to get into the basement you had to come down some rickety stairs that ended about 3 feet from the floor.

As soon as I yelled SKUNK! Hunting partner #2 cleared that 3-foot jump and was up the stairs and closed the door. He would open the door to talk to me but would not come back down the stairs to help. I had to form an escape plan in case the skunk sprayed when I shot it. I piled some rubble up below where the stairs ended to help me in my jump for freedom in case I had to run for it. I lay on the floor and stuck my pistol in the hole. I had to scoot way over against the wall and kind of curl up to see the head. I could make out a nose on the curled up skunk and knew the head was right above the nose. I shot and did a running leap for the rubble,stairs,and door. I came stumbling out and see hunting partner laughing his head off at the way I came flying out of there. We slowly opened the door back up and sniffed. Everything seemed to be fine and hunting partner #2 even followed me back into the evil depths of skunk hell. Well the skunk was dead and did not spray. His last final kicks brought him out into the open. When the dead skunk kicked out in the open he made it possible for the other skunk to get out of the hole. Now we had no idea there were two of them. Hunting partner #2 pretty much ran me over as we flew screaming up the stairs. I was close behind him. Skunk #2 was shot from upstairs in the head with a rifle very uneventfully.

Now being a thinking man I knew better than to throw the skunks and making them spray. I also had brought along a couple empty bread sacks just in case we were lucky enough to get into some skunks. It took quite a bit of pleading to get hunting partner #2 to help me stuff the skunks in the sacks. The little bit of odor that was on them had me gagging and he puked. We gently laid them in the back of HIS pickup and took off. He made me tie long strings to the bags in case the perfume came out. The idea was we could grab the strings and pull them out without having to touch the bags.

We got home with no problems.

Skinning Skunks

The next day at work I gleefully told hunting partner #1 about our fine luck. We excitedly made plans to do the deed that night when we came in from coon hunting. The day passed with the slowness that only a sense of adventure (or impending doom) can bring. We got off work and grabbed the coonhounds and took off. The ensuing events have caused me to forget how many coons we got that night, but I do know at the end of the night we had a passel of skinning to do.

Now normally we do all the skinning in my garage. I have a furnace in there and a winch that pulls the hides off the carcass. Conveniently I was out of propane and we had to use my dad’s garage. We backed my mom’s car out and hung up my dad’s skinning gambrel. The coons were all skinned and we were eyeballing the skunks. Hunting partner #1 had no prior experience with the white striped little devils and was relying on my instructions. I told him to do it just like a coon but to be ever so careful around the hind end where these little glands were.

Now the problem with using my dad’s skinning gambrel is that unlike my winch setup we had to cut and pull the hide off by hand. I was in the process of scraping the fat off a coon hide when I looked over at hunting partner #1. He was holding the long, sharp, very pointy fillet knife in such a way that if he slipped it would cut him. Just when I was about ready to tell him he was going to cut his hand off the knife slipped.

The knife went through the nasty little gland by the skunk’s hind end and into his hand by the wrist. It poked through he back side by his knuckles. There was blood SQUIRTING into the air and the garage floor was quickly covered. The stench was strong and immediate. We were both crying and gagging as we ran to the pickup and headed for the hospital. It was below feezing and we were driving down the road with the windows open and our heads hanging out. He had wrapped a skinning (dirty) rag around his hand and was holding it tight. I have to give him credit there was hardly any blood in the pickup.

Now if any of you have ever experienced slow service in the Emergency Room then you will appreciate the gleeful smile that was on my face as the nurses and doctors were running away from us when we walked in. They did not even want to talk to us we stunk so badly. Everyone in the place had on surgical masks and more than one gagged. I did feel sorry for the family that brought their dad in with a heart attack.

They had us in and stitched up so quickly it had to set records. So quick in fact they never gave him anything like anti-biotic or antiseptic or anything. Remember this part about the anti-biotic.

Now our wives know nothing about any of these adventures so we think. Except my mom had woke up and wondered why her garage light was on and her car sitting outside at 2 am. We saw her waiting for us as we pulled up to finish skinning the skunk. She was not impressed to say the least. She called our wives, who were up waiting for us. We stunk, were bloody, and slept by ourselves.

I went back the next morning to skin my skunk. I got it skinned and was scraping the fat off the hide when the stink of all this became too much for me. I lost my breakfast (some of it through my nose) all over the skunk hide. I had enough, Swearing off skunks I threw my hide away and went home to nurse my wounds.

Hunting partner #1 washed his hide in gas to unstink it and ended up with a big beautiful black and white skunk hide hanging in his living room.

A couple days later he got sick and stayed home from work. He ended up in the hospital with a BAD infection. Wonder why?

The trauma of all this had caused me to black out the worst moments. Stuff like the wife nagging about skunk stink, me sleeping in a separate room, gagging, puking, the skunk in the freezer.

It was around March when my wife told me the freezer in the back porch was unplugged. We were trying to remember when the last time we had opened it when out of the depths of my mind I remembered the skunk in the freezer. I thought it was very brave of me to tell her it was in there. She did not even comment, just gave me the look. I went out to the back porch and cracked the door about a 1/8-inch. Yep it stunk. It stunk BAD. I backed my pickup up to the back porch and hunting partner #1 came over and helped me wrestle the full freezer into the pickup. I hauled it up to hunting partner#2’s burn pit and pushed it off.

2 months later my dad went and got the freezer and cleaned it out and still uses it to this day.

I swear this is a true story; I have the emotional scars to prove it. I still don’t have a skunk hide for my wall and some day I plan to have one. My two boys love to hunt and trap maybe in a few more years I can talk them into doing it for me.
 
When I was a kid I made a regular occupation out of skunk killing. I lived in horse country and the only thing horse men hate more than groundhogs are skunks. I got a dollar for groundhogs and two dollars for skunks. My mom kept a twenty year supply of tomato juice in the barn and would make me bathe in it, usually on a daily basis during trapping season, since I insisted on skinning everything I caught. The smell actually got to where it didn't bother me too bad so I'd just come tromping in the house and flop on the couch, eyes and nose running and all. Curiously years later I broke the unit record for how long I could stay in the gas chamber in the Army. There's a hint for you if you are still planning on going to Paris Island, if you can keep your dinner after getting sprayed by a skunk, tear gas is nothin.

I had an old bird dog that I used as a hunting dog, he'd retrieve any live skunks he could find, that's why a 10 year old had use of a registered Weimeraner, he'd drop them at my feet and I'd shoot them with the .22 as soon as he backed up, of course we both would get a face full of skunk smell every time.

I read in a book one time that indian boys had to kill a badger with their bare feet to become men. Later, I caught a skunk crossing a field with snow on the ground, it sounded like a good idea at the time so I took my boots off and chased after him. I caught him pretty easy and the first jump hurt him pretty bad but I slipped in the snow and fell on top of it. After five or six bites to the feet I finally gave up jumping on it and killed it with a rock. I still had the hide up until a few years ago when we had a house fire. It was probably the most expensive skunk hide on the face of the earth. I spent three or four days in the hospital while the rabies test was done on it's head and had to have IV antibiotics from the bites. It would have probably not been so expensive except that I waited to tell my parents about it until my feet were so swollen that I couldn't put them on. For some reason they were really mad, I'm sure they would have rather that I started collecting baseball cards instead of trapped and hunted all the time. We had a huge population of skunks then, when I was trapping, out of 50 dry sets I'd catch 10-20 skunks per day, at a couple of bucks from the land owner and a couple of bucks for the hide that's a pretty good take for a 10 year old. Distemper has taken a pretty good toll on them but I still shoot about every one I see, they are hell on the turkey and grouse nests. Good luck on your quest, I never even put a dent in the population, they are alot thicker than people think. Ted
 
ALBAH, we have quite a few down in E. Texas too... We never pass up an opportunity to shoot them. We started head shooting them and they rarely spray.
 
JasonV and KYCoyote....

Thank you! You had me in tears with those 2 stories. I don't feel nearly as foolish about some of the dumb skunk things I have done.

I'll share my worst "skunk" story from way back.

My uncle and cousins lived just down the road and my uncle was skinning up a few coons he had taken with a buddy that night. I was young, but loved helping and hearing the stories. That night we were all talking about skunks for some reason and how everyone hated them, I had never really had a run in yet so I piped up they weren't so bad. I learned the power of a jinx that night. As was usually the case, I got the call to get my butt home so after dragging my feet as long as possible I grabbed my homemade skateboard and headed home.

While our houses weren't to far apart, there was a nice downhill slope between them and I was cruising on my skateboard with a good head of steam and just about to ditch it into my front yard when out of nowhere a blur of "something" was right in front of me. If you think a skateboard stops short when hitting an acorn, it stops way faster when hitting a skunk. I flew forward, and hit the pavement hard. Well the skunk was also airborne and we pretty much ended up in a giant ball rolling down the hill together. To say the skunk wasn't to happy, would be an understatement. This guy was [beeep] off and all I had to fight back with was my skateboard which while not killing him on initial impact, did knock him silent after I clobered him over the head with it after we rolled around a bit. I was kind of curious why my eyes were watering, as I didn't smell anything due to my very bloody nose clogging that sense pretty good.

I grabbed up my prize by the tail and headed back to my uncles house to show off my "hide". I could hear them in the shed complaining about something "awful" before I actually saw them. I rounded the corner proud of my victory over the skunk expecting these outdoorsmen could relate, but instead I was met with cries of horror. I was a little startled to say the least.. and raised my hand with the skunk in it to show them there was nothing to worry about it was dead, but a funny thing happened when I brought it up to eye level. It looked me dead in the eye with definite awareness. Not being afraid of skunks, I of course chucked it across the shed.... right at my uncle and cousins. Having put some time in the Corps, I can assure you that a hand grenade has a smaller blast radius than a thrown skunk. All hell broke loose then.... the skunk started spraying, men screaming and crying and diving for cover. It was a mess.

Well, I did get to sleep out in a tent that night and my uncle did start talking to me again a few years later. The skunk, last he was seen was wattling with that skunk swager back into the brush. The "shed" wasn't as popular a hang out spot for almost 6 months after that.

Your very funny stories brought me back to that memory.
 
MAJAY, thanks, skateboard huh? I never thought to kill one with a skateboard. Here's another skunk story for you, unfortunately for my parents growing up, I've got a million of them.

I slept in the barn alot when I was a kid, I'd just climb in with the dogs with a blanket. They didn't mind the smell at all but I hated it when they'd wake me up rolling on me, you know, the same way they will roll on roadkill or cow flops.
I almost forgot about this one. I had a buddy in the Army, he was from New Jersey, the closest he had ever gotten to being in the woods was the trees that grew on the sidewalk outside his apartment. Anyway, he came home on leave with me and after eating one night we decided to do some 4 wheeling. After a quick lesson we took off and I got a pretty good ways ahead of him because he was trying not to flip the 4 wheeler. We were cutting across a field when a skunk came running out of a brush pile in front of me. I pulled my autoloader pistol out of the holster, ran up beside the skunk and popped 3 or 4 shells in him and just kept going, never even hit the brakes. I got into the woodline and was afraid he'd miss the trail so I waited on him. After 3 or 4 minutes I went back to look for him. I found the skunk dead, found the 4 wheeler, still running, jammed against a fence and he was a good 400 yards from the 4 wheeler, running, screaming and stripping off his clothes. It took me about 2 hours of washing his eyes out in the creek before I got him calmed down enough to get the story. He saw the big black cat rolling around in the field, since he had a helmet on he didn't hear the shots over the 4 wheeler. He also couldn't get a good look at the cat to see what was wrong with it with the helmet on so he stopped, took it off and, although he denied it, I can almost hear him saying, "what's the matter kitty kitty". Anyway, needless to say, the cat realized he was there about the same time he realized that it weren't no cat rolling round next to the 4 wheeler. He got both barrels in the face and exited the scene quickly, blind and pretty sure I'd taken him in the woods and sprayed him with nerve gas for a laugh.
This guy was 6'5", built like a linebacker and looked and talked like a rapper. He'd fight any man alive, sometimes 3 or 4 of them at the same time. But anything that crawled, slithered or bit, he wouldn't have anything to do with. That's why we made a good team, I'd protect him from the creepy crawlies and he'd protect me from drunk Marines. I never did get brave enough to tell him I shot the skunk and that's why it was rolling around. After a week or so when the smell had gone away some I was able to laugh about it in front of him without him getting his feelings hurt. KyCoyote
 
You guys have me wiping tears as I read these. There is a certain bond between people who have been face to face with a skunk.
 


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