A couple of years back, we had an unfortunate encounter with Rat Bacon. And it’s now the pinnacle of Fucillo Family Folklore… eliciting enthusiastic reenactments and giddy giggles as I fight to control my gag reflex.
Meanwhile, last Saturday evening, the sun begins to set. We’re enjoying our post-dinner interests when we’re alerted to panicked poultry cries of alarm. Spaz is hooping and hollering so loudly you can hear her through noise-canceling headphones. But her name is Spaz for a reason.
She’s going on and on, “Help! Intruder! Oh my God, we’re all gonna die! Intruder! Run for your lives!”
Nate and I creep out. No weapons. No protective gear. Is the fox watching them? Is the bobcat back? I don’t see anything except two hens losing their shit, and the other two cowering on the highest roost in their coop.
Then I smell something.
I peer into the little coop window and a black and white tail peers back at me. It’s. In. The. Coop.
The sun is setting and I’m remembering how I’ve found cracked eggshells in the nesting box. The straw has been pushed all around in a weird way. Based on my emergency training, I point to the nearest bystander and assertively assign him the task of getting my phone. We need light. And Google.
Unfortunately, the internet convinces me I must confront the intruder. Apparently skunks can maim and/or kill your chickens. Nate gets me a big leaf rake. I get the hose and put it on the most powerful setting. Then I stealthily fling open the side door. But it’s gone. I hear it thumping and pawing on the opposite side. I shine my phone light in but I can’t see anything. For a few minutes I wonder if it’s fallen through the weakened floor of the nesting box and is trapped in the food storage area. But no, it’s just easily evading me in this expansive eight square foot house.
I fling open the second door and hide around the corner. Then I’ve got three of four doors ajar and it’s go time. I send Nate up the steps to safety so he can coach me but not get sprayed. I open the last door and blast water like the confidently untrained sister-in-law of a professional fire fighter that I am.
It runs down the ramp and into the pen instead of jumping out the nesting box doors as I’d planned. It’s circling the enclosure but can’t seem to escape. Just as I contemplate my next move, it turns itself into a ribbon of rat bacon and slips between the wood foundation and the bottom rung of metal fencing, disappearing into the night.
The coop should be condemned and I have dodged the worst of it, but we all agree my hose hand smells like skunk. I read tomato juice is a myth. After I prove them right. That night we leave our clothes outside, turn on the AC and the air purifier, and I drift off in my unfortunately located skunk bunk.
We spent this past weekend in Santa Cruz so when we got home today, Nate and I were on Skunk Patrol. I wasn’t home to put the ramp up at night, and little Pepe has definitely been back.
We do some detective work. The foundation is swept clean of rocks and straw exactly where I saw it leave– probably by a little baby skunk belly. We set up our Cabela’s Outfitter Gen 3 Trail Camera Combo to see if we can capture some nocturnal footage. We sprinkle the perimeter with red pepper and build a rake barricade at the suspected point of entry. Nate asks if we’re going to try the “rags soaked in pneumonia” method, but I haven’t had time to pick any up.
Grandma and Granddad think I should trap this baby skunk and then… well, the next part of that plan is unclear. Geoff’s skunk killing tale is not what I’d call a success story.
Nate comes in after reestablishing our wildlife trail camera and says, “Mom, I set it up and hit the griddy a few times to make sure it’s working.”
The Skunk Patrol is looking forward to tomorrow’s footage.