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What's a good way to get rid of a skunk?

carbinemike

carbinemike

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I am 95% the little bugger is living under a real low part of my back deck. What's a real good way to get rid of it beside the obvious "load up the Mossberg"? I live pretty rural but I don't think my neighbors would appreciate it going off after dark when it comes out. Mothballs and fox urine seem popular.

thanks!
 
You could try hittin it with short range less lethal, like LightFields double ball. The close/short range stuff sounds like a cap gun goin off.

Hit it with that a few times, it may decide its time to move on. I keep some of the stuff on hand here for ferral cats and wild dogs when they wanna get close or try and set up shop.
 
Thanks. I was thinking of sub-sonic .22LR too for lower noise.
 
I was hoping to get it out of here without it spraying. That's why I wondered if mothballs, fox urine etc. would work.

As a funny side story, I gave some .22 sub sonic's to a guy at work for a skunk and warned him they didn't pack the same wallop as a regular .22 LR. Didn't he just wound it and it crawled under his neighbors shed and died. They had the spray and a rotting corpse after that.
 
If you think it is living under your porch, try to spray a bunch of pepper spray under there and around where you think it is traveling, and around your garbage can or wherever there is a food source that it could be attracted to (obviously excluding where you feed your dog/animals)

You don't have to spray the skunk directly. Just make his surroundings a little unbearable and he'll probably move on.

You probably already know this, but skunks are well known to carry rabies. And if it's staying around humans (activity) I would be more than a little concerned about that.
 
John, thanks for the rabies reminder. I have two kids and cat that we let out during the day.

I had heard that they don't like light so I left the back yard flood lights on all night. Around 11:00 I saw him right beside the low part of the deck and when I opened the door he retreated there. We have a party today so I let him go. After tonight though I'll try and make his home uncomfortable.
 
If you're "just wanting it to go away", toss a couple moth balls under there. it'll find another place to hide out.
If you're wanting to get rid of it. a .22 short or an adult pellet gun is a good option.
 
Ooooooh, I forgot about a pellet gun!

We have a daisy air rifle that uses those .17 pellets, we've killed rabbits with it in a single shot. Could take care of your skunk problem?
 
Rossignol said:
Ooooooh, I forgot about a pellet gun!

We have a daisy air rifle that uses those .17 pellets, we've killed rabbits with it in a single shot. Could take care of your skunk problem?
Click to expand...
If you dont get a headshot instant kill, they will probably spray just out of reaction.
 
You could try various methods to see which one works....

Smoke bomb.
Stink bomb.
About a dozen amonia soaked rags.
Several metal mouse traps. Not the plastic ones. You really want to make it hard for them to enter. They're cheap. So get a bunch and line em up like rows in a movie theatre. No food on them...just set em up....it might jump over one row but the other rows will get em.....
After they have left put up chicken wire over all the openings. They can fit through a 4" hole!
 
A stink bomb for a skunk?

That's funny :)
 
Grab it by the tail and swing it around a few times. That will disorientate it and scare it from coming back ever again. Eliminating its food source is better though. I had a skunk problem when I left the dog's food bowl outside at night with kibble in it. Stopped going that after some close calls

Sent from my HD7 using Board Express
 
you could always be boring and call the city (assuming you live in town) and have them set up a few traps and they can deal with it....

the old ladies in the neighborhood keep the skunks, possums, and cats well fed around here...
 
Update: I didn't bother with it until today because we had a big 4th of July party. Tonight I shoved a box worth of mothballs under the deck area. Some I crushed and put down through the cracks. When my wife cleans the cat litter box I might use a stick and shove those nuggets under there too.

I don't have any trash/garbage he can get at. I did spot some of his crap and he was eating the black raspberries from the garden. They are done now so that source is gone.

We live in the sticks so calling an animal control guy isn't an option.

I'll try the nice way for now and move up the ladder of escalation as needed.

Thanks all for the comments, I'll keep you posted.
 
I try to avoid shooting at my house as even though it's considered the sticks for this county I have to houses in sight in most directions.

It has been a week now and the mothballs seem to have done the trick. I haven't smelled it around the deck where I put them. The only whiff I get is when the breeze is blowing from the south and I'm not getting it everyday.

If it comes back I'll trap it at night and use the .22 subsonic LR's on it.
 
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