Do skunks spray when suddenly trapped?

41 Colt

41 Colt

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We have a skunk problem. Will they spray the moment they are caught? I mean when the door of a box trap shuts do they get startled and spray? I know you can use a low trap so they can't lift their tails to spray but I'm not sure my squirrel trap is long enough, I may need to use my coon trap.
 
I'm dealing with a skunk issue at the moment and have caught 4 in the last week in a coon trap and none have sprayed YET...... Once they are in the trap I walk up to the trap from behind SLOWLY and vober them with a blanket. Once covered they isially calm down. You should be ok as long as you dont mobe the trap around to abroptly, just be slow with it. Good luck
 
billdick said:
A skunk can't spray if he can't raise his tail straight up in the air. It has to be all the way up or it can't spray. The tail is like a valve handle of sorts.
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x2 You can catch them in a live trap as long as their tail can't go up it's all good.
 
My dad still does this with trapped skunks. I never want to risk it though. I just pull a "New Jersey Drive" with my 10/22 from a safe distance.
mike t said:
I'm dealing with a skunk issue at the moment and have caught 4 in the last week in a coon trap and none have sprayed YET...... Once they are in the trap I walk up to the trap from behind SLOWLY and vober them with a blanket. Once covered they isially calm down. You should be ok as long as you dont mobe the trap around to abroptly, just be slow with it. Good luck
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If they cannot raise their tail they cannot spray. A friend of mine used to catch lots of them in live traps to prevent them getting to his duck traps when he was banding ducks. He would open the trap door after relocating them and they would simply back out and take off. Never had one spray after being released? Kinda wierd?
 
mike t said:
I'm dealing with a skunk issue at the moment and have caught 4 in the last week in a coon trap and none have sprayed YET...... Once they are in the trap I walk up to the trap from behind SLOWLY and cover them with a blanket. Once covered they usually calm down. You should be ok as long as you dont move the trap around to abruptly, just be slow with it.
Good luck
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Ditto: Works for us. Take them for a long ride, or they will be back.
 
41 Colt said:
We have a skunk problem. Will they spray the moment they are caught? I mean when the door of a box trap shuts do they get startled and spray? I know you can use a low trap so they can't lift their tails to spray but I'm not sure my squirrel trap is long enough, I may need to use my coon trap.
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No first hand experience here 4 Colt, but there is a story in the Delta Optimist about someone trapping a young skunk and not killing it.
The Do Gooders are trying to nurse it back to health though.
I suggest you place the trap in a dark corner and cover it with a blanket when it is tripped ...to save yourself from the peroxide and tomato juice bath.
Make sure it learns how to swim too.
FLHTCUI
 
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I have a homemade live trap that is totally enclosed. When the door is closed you know u have captured something, just gotta open the small inspection hole on top an shine a flashlight in to see what's inside.If ya gotta skunk inside just pick it up and carry it away as the animal will stay calm as it totally enclosed and doesn't feel threatened. Give it a ride to wherever and open the door and wait for it to exit.Stray cats look like they are launched like a clay pigeon, lolol
 
I catch them in a live trap and humanly dispatch them with a .22 short. Dropping it off in someone else's back yard does not solve a problem, nor are these animals endangered. I'm not driving two hours to safely release a pest animal.
 
Skunks when taken Elsewhere are usually not goin back anywhere,they are just taken away so they don't piss all over and stink up around town or a farm yard ☺☺☺
 
Live trapped a LOT of skunks around the bee yard. Never had one 'go off' in the trap. Not until they were shot, anyways.
We used a wire screen live trap because the guy whose place the yard was on had a few cats around.

A blanket or cloth over the trap works OK to transport them to the nearest rain barrel. Or wherever it's convenient.

A closed in container and squirt a couple seconds worth of diesel starting fluid (ether, they sleep, then die) is pretty effective too.

Cheers
Trev
 
When I was a kid I live trapped hundreds of skunks for a cottage association, never had one spray inside the trap, and I used large full sized traps... I would just drape a rubber matt with a slot in the middle so that I could reach the handle on the top of the trap... walked them down to the boat and reloacted them to a large uninhabited island... the locals still call it skunk island forty years later, even though that is not the name on the map. On days when the water was too rough to go across the channel, it was bad news for Pepe Le Pew... he only got to the lake shore.

In all those years, I only got sprayed once... I was tired and just decided to release a big, old skunk rather than dunking him... I opened the door and he took off, just as he was going around the corner of the shed, he let fly... nailed me full-on in the face. Little bugger.
 
Thank you. And the other skunk's that live where you don't drop off a disease-ridden refugee, also thank you.
fiddler said:
I catch them in a live trap and humanly dispatch them with a .22 short. Dropping it off in someone else's back yard does not solve a problem, nor are these animals endangered. I'm not driving two hours to safely release a pest animal.
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