We had this skunk digging around our chicken coop. I had some traps left at my Dads place from way back when I attempted to trap. I showed Justin how powerful the traps were and we (Him, Dad, and I) talked about trapping and what-not.
Well, we locked up the cats in a cage and set the trap over night. Nothing happened. We did the same thing for the second night and wouldn't you know it, he caught the skunk! I ended up shooting it with my shotgun right before the school bus came and it stunk sooooo bad!
But Justin was a very excited boy to trap his first animal.
I had school that evening and I did talk to Kari about the skunk, which was still in the trap (dead) and smelling. I told her what I needed to do with it and to keep the kids away.
Kari told the kids before they even got home "Stay away from the skunk, Dad will put rubber gloves on and remove the stinky animal"
Justin said "ok". He did his homework and he ate supper and he watched some tv. Then Kari noticed he was gone...she walked into his bedroom and did some cleaning and then she came back out into the living room and smelled skunk...she heard something in the kitchen and here it was Justin. He was smelling like a fresh sprayed skunk and digging thru the drawers. Kari asked what he was doing and he promptly replied "I am looking for a sharp knife so I can take out the skunks teeth and nails to make necklaces".
The boy already took the skunk out of the trap and had it laid out behind the house for skinning.
The following morning I mentioned about a neighbor offering to boil the skull so we can make a European Mount. Justin agreed and thought that was a great idea, then he came outside with 2 knives his Grandpa gave him.
I was on my way on a date with Kari and told him I couldn't help him skin a skunk head right now! So he asked how to do it. I displayed on my own neck how to cut the skin and meat, then how to break the bone. I displayed the technique for removing the remainder of the skin from the skunks head. I left on my date.
During the day I asked Kari "Do you think he skun out that skunk?" and Kari didn't have a doubt that it wasn't complete. She knew he would do it.
When we got home it was late. I was ready for bed and nearly ready to crawl under the covers, when I remembered that skunk head. I couldn't resist. I put boots on and grabbed my flashlight. I walked into the dark wearing nothing but boots and underwear and walked into the woods where I last saw Justin working on his skunk. Sure enough, there it was. Two knives stabbed into the ground near a body of a skunk and the head detached.
I was proud of that 7 year old. I picked up the skunk head and finished taking off the pelt then I noticed the skull was damaged. I was disappointed, mainly because now all his work was worth nothing.
In the morning I told Justin about the damaged skull, probably from when I shot it with the shotgun. I told him its best we don't boil it, however we could let nature do its work by placing the skull in a plastic bag and letting bugs clean it. That's what we did.
3 days later I was talking to my Dad. He said Justin called him the other day and asked "How do you take skin of a skunks head, Grandpa?" Grandpa chuckled...and he more less turned the question back to me.
