The nearly white visitor on the wart; Deb Marshall art |
Yesterday was the Spring Equinox. There was a beautiful
bright full moon, and there are several signs that Spring is actually on its
way, despite my on-going war with nursery companies determined to follow USDA
wacky-tabacky-inspired rezoning guidelines to ship fruit trees and asparagus
crowns vs. my assertion that I still have many feet of snow in my yard and will
continue to have snow until sometime in late April. But, there’s a moist
spring-like quality to the air; the
Buddha’s head and shoulders are now out of the deep snow; I can see the very
top of the smaller compost bins and the
old compost bin, which have been invisible since December; I can see all the
cement-block walls of the raised beds closest the house, and most of the snow
has melted from the pea-stone path that lies between those beds and the south
wall of the house.
As far as Catmandoo is concerned, the most important sign is
that the melting-and-freezing that’s gone on during the last week means that
the snow cover is now topped by crusty snow that will bear his
not-inconsiderable weight, so he can patrol beyond the kitchen and back warts,
finally. We looked out the window earlier this week and saw him perched atop
the pile in the middle of the old compost bin, apparently peering intently at
his feet. Most likely, there was mousie activity below the snow under his feet.
But from my point of view, one of the surest signs that
Spring is coming is: Skunks!
Skunks hibernate and usually come out of their deep sleep
sometime in February to mate. You can tell they’re out by the faint scent of
them floating in the evening air. Once they’re out, they don’t go back to bed,
as bears will if it’s too cold and there’s nothing to eat.
The skunks were a little late this year, because of the cold
and huge heaps of snow, no doubt – I didn’t detect the first one until last
week. They usually spend a lot of their evening hours scratching up the compost
bins, but there’s too much snow for that to be very profitable this season. As
I was heading to bed one night, I noticed that the light on the kitchen wart
was on – one of us must have turned it on and forgotten to turn it off. But
when I checked, the switches were off.
So, I wondered, it must be the motion-sensitive light that’s
kicked on. I wonder what caused that?
I wonder if…there’s a BEAR on the
wart? Wouldn’t be the first time I misjudged feeding the birds.
I peered out, carefully, from the kitchen door window and
didn’t see anything – no moving darkness. I put the light on – still nothing.
Yet, the motion-sensor light was full on. Hmmpf. I cautiously opened the inside
door to get a better look. Still nothing. Maybe I’ll carefully step outside and
see if there’s a bear out in the driveway?
Just as I started to open the storm door, I saw it – a
waddling, wide, flat expanse of white with a little black snoot and feet, three
feet from the door, snuffling up fallen birdseed and nuts just like a vacuum
cleaner. It paid no attention to me. I shut the door, and then the inside door,
quickly and quietly. Then I hoofed it to the other end of the house. And
considered that it was only about an hour or so since I’d arrived home at 10 pm
(I work late) and merrily bounced up the stairs and across the deck without
looking first. That won’t happen
again; I’m now singing the Here I Come skunk-warning song between garage and
kitchen door, and keeping my fingers crossed that there’s no skunk
investigating the trash can in the garage when I pull in!
Next day, a patient told me she was taking her daily walk
down the road that runs by her house, and noticed that someone had dumped one
of those recycled-woven-plastic shopping bags, and it had blown or slid
half-way down the very steep bank on one
side of the road. She regularly picks up uncompostable trash people toss from
their cars, and this particular bag appeared to be in great shape and
potentially useful, so in spite of the steep hill coated in ice and snow, she
made a long, shallow trek towards it, and grabbed it by a bottom corner, and tugged
to free it from the icy crust.
Oh no, she thought, it’s heavy – it’s probably got something
gross in it, like dirty diapers. So she gingerly pulled it up to see what would
slide out.
As she pulled, the bag seemed to come alive. It sighed,
turned ‘round and ‘round, and settled down again, flicking some lovely skunk fur
briefly out the opening. My patient backed up very, very carefully, and said
she heard a little snoring sound coming from the bag as she retreated.
I told those two stories to a friend, and she added her own:
one night she and her husband had heard a scratching noise either against the
wall or the window of their bedroom. There was a bush just outside that room,
and she assumed that branches were rubbing against the house. Next day, they went
out to see what needed to be cut back. They soon discovered that the scratching
noises were actually coming from the gutter drainpipe that ran down that corner
of the house. So the husband got a hack saw and carefully cut the drainpipe,
expecting that a bird had somehow gotten in and couldn’t get out.
Friend and husband checking out what was trapped in the downspout; Deb Marshall art |
From the top of the cut pipe, two black paws and a black
snoot with bright eyes and a lovely white stripe on its head peered out. The
skunk – maybe a baby, maybe not, they didn’t wait around to see what size
critter fully emerged – had decided to explore the pipe, and once in, was too
big to turn around to get out again!
My first hound dog was a huge boy: Beauregard Barnaby
Pissbark was 110 pounds, tall, with a massive chest. It took him a few moments
to get going, but once he did, he could run forever. He was great friends with
Squeaker, one of the cats we had then, and enjoyed Puddy, too, and pretty much
loved all kitties. His favorite way to greet them was to bound up behind, tuck
his snoot under their back ends, and lift them up hind-end first into the air.
Somehow, I never learned not to let him out loose at night
to pee. Never. More than once; more than twice; let’s not count – I’d let Beau
out, and off he’d go towards the compost bins where a beautiful, unknown
black-and-white kitty was digging into the bin. He was there in a few bounds,
before the kitty realized it and could back out. His snoot between its back
legs and under its belly, he’d lift and the kitty headed skyward. Then the “kitty”
would slide off, spraying – but each time it was so surprised it never sprayed
fast enough to get him in the face, but only on his massive chest. Pleased as
could be with his new friend, Beau would then bound back to the house and whack
the door handle to let me know he was ready to come in, and in he’d come, eager
for his treat – and shake shake shake shake skunk stink all over the kitchen. And
the two of us would spend the next hour or so, in the dark, in the cold, on the
kitchen wart, having a couple of baths in “Skunk Be Gone.”
Beauregard Barnaby Pissbark greeting a "kitty"; Deb Marshall art |
A friend from the Dark Ages when I worked in the computer
publishing industry and he was a techie who wrote for us, had a wife who was
completely in love with cats but totally, horribly allergic to them. So they
had a bunch of cats that lived in their barn, complete with kitty beds and
toys, and my friend fed them out in the yard in sight of the kitchen window,
where he often sat at the kitchen table reading or writing. He fed them a
couple of times a day, and mentally kept track to make sure all the cats had
eaten a meal.
One night, after dark, he looked up from his book and saw
that there was a lone cat out by the food dishes and realized that the food he’d put out
several hours before was surely gone. So he took a fresh can out and filled the
bowl, thinking about the technical puzzle he’d been working on, and idly
reached down and stroked the cat as it was gobbling up cat food.
After a few strokes, it occurred to him that this cat’s fur
felt unusually thick, so he snapped out of his reverie and looked closely to
see which one it was. As you’ve guessed, it was a skunk; he gave it one last
pat and walked slowly away, wondering how many times he’d fed that particular
kitty without noticing.
Breathe deep: the smell of Spring is in the air!
I once saw a skunk at about noon crossing the street in Melrose, MA in broad daylight and with a fair amount of traffic on that street. Thought it was quite odd.
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