What’s black and white and runs all over? The tiny western spotted skunk, Oregon State University researchers found.
The skunk, which resembles a black and white tube sock, weighs just one or two pounds and covers a home range of up to 12-square miles while looking for food, according to research by Oregon State postdoctoral student Marie Tosa. That’s far more ground than the black-tailed deer, which roams a home range of only a square mile, the university said in a promotional video.
Scientists don’t know much about the spotted skunk, which lives in western mountain ranges from Mexico to Canada and is smaller than the striped-skunk that frequents urban areas.
Tosa chased the tiny nocturnal creatures around the H.G. Andrews forest, east of Eugene, between 2017 and 2019, trapping and sedating the skunks, then fitting them with radio collars to track their movements. Her team wanted to better understand the skunks’ lifestyles and their role in the forest ecosystem.
“I was sprayed… so many times,” Tosa said in a video created by Oregon State. She puts the tally somewhere between 50 and 100.
Tosa’s research, published in the journal Ecosphere in August, established that the small creatures live in both old growth and young forests and are vulnerable to heavy winter snows.
Western spotted skunks are believed to be fairly common, but researchers at one point thought the same thing about the Eastern spotted skunk, Tosa said. That species’ population declined 99% between 1940 and 1980 and is now listed as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The reasons for that skunk’s decline are not well known because the species wasn’t studied extensively, said Damon Lesmeister, a biologist with the U.S. Forest Service who studied the skunks alongside Tosa.
The scientists hope that their research will help focus future studies on the skunk and identify potential threats to its survival.
Since Tosa’s research wrapped up in 2019, the H.G. Andrews Forest has been hit by several major wildfires.
“We think that the western spotted skunks would be adapted to fire,” she said, “but we have really no idea how that affected the western spotted skunks.”
Some handy advice from the experts if you have a close encounter and get sprayed: To eliminate the skunkiness, try a paste of hydrogen peroxide, Dawn dish soap and baking soda.
Sami Edge covers higher education and politics for The Oregonian. You can reach her at [email protected] or (503) 260-3430.
