Skunk Prevention Tips: How to Keep Skunks Away

For most home owners, they do not want any kind of wild animals near their homes. Foxes can attack pets, raccoons and opossums get into the garbage and leave parasites in their waste and squirrels love to get into everything, often making a home in any crack or crevice they can find in your home. All of them can turn a beautiful home into an animal battlefield that ruins the look and tranquility of your home.

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While all of these animals are quite a nuisance, home owners dread skunks most of all. These are the animals they want to see as far away from their home as possible and with good reason. Skunks have large anal scent glands that allow them to accurately spray the most pungent smelling liquid at any predator who dares to cross their path.



Because of this horrific smell owners want to do all they can to keep these animals away. Unfortunately dogs are sometimes too foolish to stay away from them and so they can be sprayed leaving with you with a horrifically smelling dog you have to try to clean. The smell can ruin your home, and make coming home a nightmare. Plus there is the added part that many skunks carry rabies. This makes them one of the worst creatures on the planet to cross paths with.

If you are having problems with skunks coming near your property here are some helpful tips to keep away skunks yourself.

The first thing you can do is remove any potential food sources that the skunk would find appetizing. The most common source of food at your home for the skunk is the garbage can. If you can put these in your garage or your shed that is the place to put it. If not then ensure that the lids are securely fastened. If you cannot do this then buy some bungee cord and create a locking mechanism that makes the trash cans hard to take off. Keep in mind that if your garbage is accessible they will come. Just imagine what a nightmare that will be if you take out your garbage and find a skunk there. You may wind up sleeping outside for weeks.

If you have a dog or cat don’t leave their food and water dish outside. This a great source of food to a skunk and they will happily eat the same things that Spot or Tabby eats. Keep these indoors. In the same vein, if you have a bird feeder make sure that it is not accessible to the skunk at all. This means keeping it up so the skunk can’t push on it or the pole it is on. They don’t need to get into the feeder. They just need to push on it so that food falls that they can eat. You have to stop this.

Your garden can be a tasty source of food. Make sure you have a fence up, and that the fence is buried at least 12 inches into the ground. Remember that these animals are incredible diggers and so a couple of inches is just not going to do it.

A great way to keep them away is with light. Since these animals have such poor eye sight they prefer it to be as dark as possible. If you have big lights shining outside this can often be deterrent enough. Many people suggest using a motion detector light because it will be more shocking to the skunk, but I think this is a terrible idea. The skunk’s reaction to being startled is to fight with his butt aimed at whatever it fears. I prefer not to provoke the skunk to fire at will.

Now motion sensors on your sprinkler system is an entirely different thing to effectively keep skunks away. This is a really good idea. When the sensors detect something moving they will come out shooting water and this will most definitely cause the skunk to run. It is the perfect way to get that skunk out of there.

While skunks are omnivores, they do not like everything. A good idea is to make a mixture of jalapeno and cayenne peppers and boil them in about a quart of water for about 20 minutes. Then take the liquid mixture and spray it in high traffic areas where you suspect the skunk is visiting. When that mixture gets on the skunks tongue he or she will go running. You will finally be rid of that horrific beast, hopefully for good.

Of course, the common sense way to keep them away is to have a fence up that they cannot enter. If you are able to put a fence around your property that is deep enough into the ground so that it can’t dig underneath you will have great success at keeping the skunk away.

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