Anybody have good ideas on how to get rid of skunks?

[ARC]

Try spraying them with some stinky stuff.

Give em a taste of their own medicine ... :P

 

[RJ55]

If you want to get rid of them permanently. A slice of lite bread with a bit of peanut butter . Mold the bread around the trigger of a 220 connibear trap. Snaps the neck, and usually they don’t have time to spray.😉

 

[Brad Tipton]

So we have an old 3-stall garage that is impossible to seal up tightly. It has standard garage stuff plus we keep packing materials for the business in it (pallets of boxes, packing peanuts, &c). Outside, against one wall, is our firewood, a couple of full cords stacked. This winter, for the first time, we have skunk essence emanating from the garage, any time we open it. We used to have problems with squirrels but we were able to close up the problems on the backside foundation where those were coming in. The skunks I think come in from the front - the garage has shifted over the years and now the three tracked garage doors do not evenly touch the ground, but are cocked with enough space on one side of them for critters to go in.

I live within town limits that would prohibit the use of firearms as a cure.

Any ideas?

First, contract a garage door installer/repair to check out the counterweight springs. I had your issue with the doors not setting right, and that mostly corrected the issue.
Otherwise you could use square aluminum tube screwed to the outside bottom of the doors, angled to contact the ground. Or build up the pavement with concrete to match the bottoms of the doors.
I had a similar problem with possums using the cat door to enter. I used a 22 rifle to eliminate them. Inside the garage with the doors closed, the shots are barely audible outside.

 

[Gare]

BEST and SAFEST way I know of is to HIRE it 111 OR Fly Bait with coke
should not go more then 15 feet from the dish

 

[CreakyDigger]

First, contract a garage door installer/repair to check out the counterweight springs. I had your issue with the doors not setting right, and that mostly corrected the issue.
Otherwise you could use square aluminum tube screwed to the outside bottom of the doors, angled to contact the ground. Or build up the pavement with concrete to match the bottoms of the doors.
I had a similar problem with possums using the cat door to enter. I used a 22 rifle to eliminate them. Inside the garage with the doors closed, the shots are barely audible outside.

Thanks for the tips, and welcome to TNet.

 

[CreakyDigger]

So far keeping a radio on out there, spraying entryways with the kind of thing you spray around your garden to keep rabbits out, and some supplemental night time pee stops, we think the skunks have departed. Time will tell,

 

[Oldmanwalking]

So we have an old 3-stall garage that is impossible to seal up tightly. It has standard garage stuff plus we keep packing materials for the business in it (pallets of boxes, packing peanuts, &c). Outside, against one wall, is our firewood, a couple of full cords stacked. This winter, for the first time, we have skunk essence emanating from the garage, any time we open it. We used to have problems with squirrels but we were able to close up the problems on the backside foundation where those were coming in. The skunks I think come in from the front - the garage has shifted over the years and now the three tracked garage doors do not evenly touch the ground, but are cocked with enough space on one side of them for critters to go in.

I live within town limits that would prohibit the use of firearms as a cure.

Any ideas?

I had six skunks in the crawl space under my house. I set up a camera and counted them. I tried all the scents, moth balls, ammonia, cat litter and nothing worked. I put a large blue tooth speaker under there and blasted rap music. They all left and haven't returned and it's been more than a year. Nobody likes rap music.

 

[crashbandicoot]

That is true. Little known fact is many wild animals had their mother ran over by a train while waiting on their brother at the station coming home from prison to pick up his old truck.

While drunk!

 

[crashbandicoot]

Get a live trap for skunks. They can't raise their tail to piss when they get in them. Once you get them trapped take them out to a wooded area and release them, carefully! They are beneficial animals, no need to kill them. Good luck.

UH,maybe your skunks can,t spray in a live trap,ours can.

 

[TooManyHobbies]

UH,maybe your skunks can,t spray in a live trap,ours can.

That's one of those lessons that have to be learned the hard way . I think it was my fifth skunk caught (in a small cage) that taught me that lesson. And numerous more since.

 

[Fat]

 

[crashbandicoot]

So far keeping a radio on out there, spraying entryways with the kind of thing you spray around your garden to keep rabbits out, and some supplemental night time pee stops, we think the skunks have departed. Time will tell,

Sounds like you may have a handle on it. If all that don,t work Dizzy,s link is a good one.Do not handle the skunks yourself,regardless of what,s been said here skunks can and will spray when it damn well pleases them,in or out of a trap,covered or not. Don,t handle 220 Conibears unless you know exactly what you,re doing,the damn things can and will break bones if you get a hand or arm in them and have a hair trigger when set.If it comes to that,call a pro animal control guy who is licensed. Not trying to bust you out,just some hard won advice to keep you from the same mistakes I made. I could handle 220s when I was 25,not so much now at 70. In the meantime,read Dizzy,s link. Best of luck.Jim.

 

[crashbandicoot]

View attachment 2007685View attachment 2007686

Little known to a lot of folks,skunks are great diggers,as your pics show.Great pics Fat,per usual.

 

[ticndig]

imagine if you will. put up a motion activated light , in one of the bulb holes place a screw in receptacle . you will then plug in and place a vibratory sander and some gravel in a metal bucket. when the skunk activates the lights the sander will shake and rattle the bucket and scare off the skunk.

 

[crashbandicoot]

imagine if you will. put up a motion activated light , in one of the bulb holes place a screw in receptacle . you will then plug in and place a vibratory sander and some gravel in a metal bucket. when the skunk activates the lights the sander will shake and rattle the bucket and scare off the skunk.

Thinking outside the box there ticndig.That,s a good one and no harm done to the skunk or the skunkee.

 

[Ohiogoldfever]

I had a terrible skunk problem for a while. I tried everything! Repellants, traps, shot gun.... what finally worked was the day I’d finally had enough. I ran across the back yard and started digging under the shed with my hands like a mad man. With rage in my eyes I dug and dug, thrashing at the soil. In what seemed like seconds I found a large nest mother skunk turned and ready to fire. I don’t know what came over me I screamed as loud as I could.

Just then she shot me right in the face, her spray filling my nose and throat. The smell was the most Intense thing I’ve ever experienced. I woke up ten hours later in the ICU.

I moved. No more skunks.

 

[Gare]

A plastic coke bottle tapped over the end of the barrel quiets it also

 

[Ohiogoldfever]

A plastic coke bottle tapped over the end of the barrel quiets it also

Better watch it!!! The ATF will come shoot your dog over comments like that.

 

[traveller777]

That's one of those lessons that have to be learned the hard way . I think it was my fifth skunk caught (in a small cage) that taught me that lesson. And numerous more since.

Listen, I just talked to my cousin Bubba. He swears if you get the skunk drunk you can just walk up to it and pick it up and haul it off. He said he uses Pabst but said any beer should work. But Bubba said if the skunk says, "Hold my beer and watch this" then you best run like the wind.

 

[CreakyDigger]

Sounds like you may have a handle on it. If all that don,t work Dizzy,s link is a good one.Do not handle the skunks yourself,regardless of what,s been said here skunks can and will spray when it damn well pleases them,in or out of a trap,covered or not. Don,t handle 220 Conibears unless you know exactly what you,re doing,the damn things can and will break bones if you get a hand or arm in them and have a hair trigger when set.If it comes to that,call a pro animal control guy who is licensed. Not trying to bust you out,just some hard won advice to keep you from the same mistakes I made. I could handle 220s when I was 25,not so much now at 70. In the meantime,read Dizzy,s link. Best of luck.Jim.

I used to set a few conibears back when I ran traps as a wee teenager....I don't remember the number, set them for muskrats.