Rabid Skunks Are No Match For Sharpshooting Women
By Sandy Vondrasek Cooch

Last week in the White River Valley was a great week for women sharpshooters- and a bad one for rabid skunks.

Last Monday, July 16, Tammy Ladd dispatched with one bullet a skunk that was tangling with her dog in the yard of the Ladds' Randolph Center home.

Five days later, Julie Kinney of Battles Brook Road in Braintree dug out her old hunting rifle and headed out to find and kill- again with a single shot- the skunk that had just bitten one of her four horses.

This week state public health veterinarian Dr. Bob Johnson said that the skunk from Randolph had tested positive for rabies. Results are still pending for the Braintree animal, but it was "highly suspicious," he said Tuesday. Both of the domestic animals bitten had been vaccinated for rabies and need only booster shots.

If the skunk that Julie Kinney shot Friday comes back as rabid, it will be the 104th confirmed case in the state this year. Only a few of those cases have been from this area. The majority have been in northern Vermont, mostly in Franklin County.

Tammy Ladd reported this week that she had pulled in her Tabor Road drive last Monday afternoon, July 16, to find a "really bad" skunk smell. She looked in the yard to "see a skunk literally spraying the dog." The dog, a walker-type hunting dog, was tied up on a run and unable to escape.

It should be noted here that Ladd was one of the lucky folks whose name was recently selected in a state-wide lottery for moose permits. She hadn't been hunting in years, Ladd said, and so she had been target practicing with her hunter husband Jason just the day before the skunk appeared.

"Freaked out" by the scene in her yard Monday, Ladd called her husband, who was at work.

"My husband said, 'You have to shoot it. Use the gun you used yesterday,'" Ladd related.

"I told him there were only two bullets left. He told me, 'Don't miss.'"

Getting a good shot was a challenge. The two animals were fighting and Ladd didn't want to risk shooting the dog.

She finally got off a shot- only to watch the skunk roll, and then get back on its feet and go into the doghouse. The dog followed, and then came back out "with the skunk clamped on its leg."

Ladd said the skunk then headed back into the doghouse, and didn't come back out again.

Ladd said she had to go to work and her husband later shook the dead skunk out of the doghouse. The animal was collected and tested, and Ladd was later advised that her shot was a good one.

Braintree Skunk

On Friday, July 20, Julie Kinney was cleaning out the barn that houses her four horses, while keeping a watchful eye on them in the field. Her neighbor Ray Gray had phoned earlier in the morning, Kinney said, to report a skunk in the neighborhood that was "acting weird."

Suddenly one of her horses started running and "appeared at the door, stinking to high heaven of skunk."

Kinney grabbed a pitchfork, just in case the skunk was near, and went to the house to get her .30- caliber carbine. Formerly a hunter, Kinney said she hadn't hunted in years: "I just don't like to shoot anything," she said.

But this was different.

Kinney said the horse that had been bitten had been in the corner of the field, near the road, so she got in her pickup and drove out, looking. Neighbor Nancy Gray flagged Kinney down and shouted, "It's in my flower bed."

Kinney walked towards the bed, and called to the skunk, from about 25 feet away because it was walking "straight away" from her. Kinney wanted it to turn, so she would have a better shot.

She didn't have time, Kinney said, to worry about personal safety, and in any case, it was over quickly.

"It turned sideways and I shot it."

After tending to her horse, which was bitten on the nose, Kinney dealt with the skunk, donning rubber gloves to doublebag it in plastic. Following advice from Dr. Johnson, she added baking soda, hydrogen peroxide and dish washing liquid, which effectively deodorized the stillstinking contents.

Thanks to the assistance of the Randolph Animal Hospital, the skunk's head was taken to the state lab for testing. Kinney, who formerly worked at the Animal Hospital, noted that she has, for years, made sure that all of her horses are regularly vaccinated for rabies. Her two-year-old horse has recovered from the incident, she said.

Rabies is a fatal viral disease found mainly in wildlife, especially raccoons, foxes, bats, skunks, and woodchucks.

State public health veterinarian Dr. Johnson this week stressed the importance of vaccinating pets and livestock. People should to avoid contact with wild animals, including what appear to be orphaned baby animals.

Anyone bitten by an animal should wash the wound immediately and call a doctor.

For more information, call the state rabies hotline: 1-800-4- RABIES.