how long have you like skunks?

Oh geez, for as long as I can remember. Certainly sometime in elementary school.

Do you have a favorite animal besides the skunk?

Hyenas, Mustelids, Rats, and some Big Cats

Sounds cool!

agreed

Have you ever been 'skunked' IRL? Or come close?

Nope, but I hope I will one day. Probably a bad idea, but I still want to experience it.

When did you first created Liane?

I'm not sure it would be a fun experience, but it would definitely be something to remember. *giggles* I've had a couple of sorta close calls, but the skunk didn't fire. I'm just as happy they didn't. ;3

Not that darn long ago really, though it seems like a lifetime. 2009 was when I first commissioned an artist on dA to make me a sexy vampire rabbit girl and here is her first picture. http://www.furaffinity.net/view/2812384/ she's come a ways since then.

I rarely ever see wild skunks and the ones I have seen weren't in my hometown. I'd love to at least see them more often.

I haven't where I live either. I blundered across one after dark in a campground once that stamped at me and turned around but I beat a hasty retreat and it went on it's way. Another time I was driving along and saw a mink running in a field of tall grass. There were a lot of mink farmers around there who'd buy minks from you and I had a pair of welding gloves in my truck, so I decided to catch it and sell it. I stopped, put on my gloves and went after it. I could just see a glimpse of it above the grass here and there as it skipped along. Just as I caught up to it and was about to pounce, it stuck it's head and tail up at the same time and I realized it wasn't a mink but a skunk and I was SO close to just grabbing it! Would have been a good joke on me!!

I haven't been camping before (I need my internets lol), but I assume it'd be a good time to see skunks.

It can be, depending on where you go. And I take my internets with me. Got a USB device that works like a cell phone and gets my internets wherever cell service is. Of course I have to have it cause I have always lived mobile. Been living in a camper on my truck for nearly 20 years till just last summer when I got a trailer so's to have more room. ;3

Sounds handy!

Definitely is!!

Skunkbomb's said in previous journals that he's smelled 100% pure quill skunk musk right out of the bottle and it didn't bother him at all, so I'm pretty sure being sprayed wouldn't be a negative experience for him, especially if he took precautions like I do when I get sprayed (goggles, protective clothing if you don't want the oils sticking to hair and skin, etc.)

I see. I'm new to following him, so I didn't know about that. But it could still be a bummer if he didn't take precautions. You can't always know when you are going to get sprayed. ;3

BTW, what are you doing that you know you're going to get sprayed, if I might ask?

Honestly? Going to the lake and finding every skunk I can that I can get to spray me. Adults usually run and do shotgun-style sprays as they do so, but sometimes kits will challenge me, doing the scooting and stomping warnings, and spray me voluntarily. I prefer the latter since it's less stressful for the skunks and I let them think they won.

Hmmm.... Since you're being honest here, why do you do that? I'm wondering how you can find that enjoyable.

The smell is packed with pheromones that smell amazingly sweet and both relax me and have a nice aphrodisiac effect. I'm hardly alone in loving the scent (as Skunkbomb would attest, and 10% of Americans polled admitted to liking it) but I'm rare in actively seeking out skunks to get doused. If I had an armed pet skunk, of course, I would stop chasing wild ones, because it is a rather gray area morally, even though I go out of my way never to actually harm the little guys.

No kidding? That's amazing! I've smelled it somewhat faintly many times and never found it too objectionable. But to actually have an aphrodisiac effect. Hmmmm.... I wonder if that part of it could be synthesized and bottled. Might be some market for that....

BTW here's an interesting article I just found about smells and why we like or dislike them. I'm still looking for something about aphrodisiac properties to skunk. http://www.dana.org/Cerebrum/Default.aspx?id=39206

But also, I just happened to think. I'm a 64 year old, and there have been several distinct 'periods' to my life. Times I've lived in different places, had different jobs, enjoyed different hobbies and several other things that separated one 'period' from another. And the memory of each one can be evoked by a particular smell. Or to put it another way, each period has it's own distinctive odor to me which I can nearly smell when I think about that time of my life. I've never discussed this with anyone before, so don't know if this is a common thing or just something that happens to me. Does it happen to you that you are aware of?

Smell is the sense most closely tied to memory so that doesn't surprise me at all. People often like unusual scents because they bring back positive memories, like someone liking a particular cigar their father smoked, or loving to smell the same perfume their mother wore, etc.

There used to be a company called Whiffy, Inc. that sold little bottles of skunk scent for skunk lovers, founded by a skunk scent lover who put an ad in USA Today looking for others like her and who got literally thousands of replies.

I would LOVE to bottle the aphrodisiac parts of skunk, they're amazing. They smell to me like root beer and bananas, and something else sweet and floral (violets maybe?), hard to put my finger on it but it's very intense and most noticeable in a fresh full-blown spray, especially from a female that is pregnant or in heat (which seems to ramp up those properties in their scent due to hormones). Probably the sweetest skunk I'd ever smelled was a female that sprayed me heavily during mating season. I actually ended up with a repetitive stress injury in my left shoulder (that still flares up occasionally to this day) after my, ah, "enjoyment" of her scent for 48 hours.

]That's another reason I chase so often though, the best parts of skunk only seem to be viable for 24-48 hours or so after a spray, then fade out and leave you only with the sulfur/garlic/gasoline thiol parts which aren't nearly as enjoyable (or socially acceptable)

So that's why I like the smell of turpentine so much. It reminds me of my favorite grandmother who used to paint and had brushes soaking in turpentine sitting around all the time, which I smelled a lot.

That's pretty cool about Whiffy. Too bad she's not doing it anymore. I liked the article!

I'd kinda like to try that spray from a female in mating season myself, I think. My shoulder is nice and strong. ;3

If it makes you feel any better you always can order skunk scent online both in diluted and pure quill form. Granted, that's not getting it from Whiffy...Marilyn was collecting the scent from live skunks using non-human methods, and the hunting supply stores extract and milk dead skunks' scent glands.

Of course, pure quill skunk scent is very hard to contain. I have to keep mine in multiple layers of space bags to reduce the odor, then put THAT in a trunk, and even then keep it outside so the scent doesn't contaminate clothing. As much as I love that scent, it's gotten me in trouble at several different jobs for violation of hygiene.

Whew! That pure quill looks like potent stuff! Thanks for the links.

Have you ever smelled a real, angry skunk :O?
I got to sample the smell at a zoo way back lol. They got this button you could press and it would blow skunk scented air!!

I doubt that stuff is anywhere near as strong as real skunk though

I bet since it didn't really smell much..

I don't think I have. What zoo is this? That sounds cool!

It was Korkeasaari in Helsinki, Finland. It was nearly 20 years ago though..

Ah, okay. I've never been to Finland.

Many haven't :'3 This is a great place to be, except we got no skunks hehe

I just saw a video on Youtube uploaded about a month ago with someone trying the skunk air thing.

Now I need to find it :-D!

Let me know how it smells!

I'll report asap hehe