Season of the skunk: Northern Alberta city offers free capture services for smelly pests

A northern Alberta city has taken a unique approach to managing a distinctly odiferous animal.

The City of Cold Lake has hired a full-time skunk trapper and is offering free skunk removal services to residents.

Mayor Craig Copeland said the program is all about keeping homes and busi‐ nesses odour-free in the city of 15,000 people, 300 kilome‐ tres northeast of Edmonton.

"We're a community that's living sort of on the fringe of the bush," Copeland said. "Skunks here can be a prob‐ lem."

Skunks thrive in urban en‐ vironments. Their striped tails are a common sight in communities across Alberta. Although they are docile for‐ agers who largely keep to themselves, they pose a unique challenge due to the pungent perfume they spray when threatened.

Larger cities such as Cal‐ gary and Edmonton don't of‐ fer skunk removal services, and officials in Cold Lake be‐ lieve they may be the first Al‐ berta community to do it.

Copeland said many mu‐ nicipalities leave residents to manage the pests on their own but Cold Lake council decided the city should in‐ stead handle the "nasty busi‐ ness" of trapping skunks.

Getting sprayed by a skunk is an experience most people are eager to avoid. Contracting out the service ensures residents can keep their distance, he said.

"Pepé Le Pew is a little bit of a different animal to deal with," he said. "It's a stinky situation."

The program, which be‐ gan in June 2023, has been renewed just in time for when Alberta's striped skunk population wakes from a winter spent sleeping under‐ ground and begins its breed‐ ing season.

"If you don't deal with them, they're going to make more skunks," Copeland said.

The 'skunk guy'

The Cold Lake service is a capture and release pro‐ gram. Residents struggling with any of the unwelcome visitors can simply call in a request for help.

Once the city's contractor, or "skunk guy," gets a call, he is allotted five consecutive days to stage a careful cap‐ ture, Copeland said.

Any skunks trapped by the contractor are relocated into the forest on the out‐ skirts of the city where they are less likely to cause a stink.

The program launched last spring and, after a recent review by city council, the service has been renewed for another year of service.

The contractor gets $250 for each relocated skunk, and $130 if trapping efforts were unsuccessful.

In 2023, there were 33 re‐ quests for the service. Four‐ teen skunks were removed from 14 different locations. There were 19 unsuccessful attempts at capture.

In all, the program cost around $6,000. Andrew Jabs, a planning manager for the City of Cold Lake who helped develop the program, said it was money well spent.

He said the program has proved a success and he ex‐ pects it grow this spring.

"Lending a little support from a professional to make sure you don't get sprayed or you don't make a big mess of your property or your neigh‐ bours' property, I think it goes a long way."

A solitary stinker

Sage Raymond, an ecologist and University of Alberta graduate researcher who studies urban wildlife, said skunks are well-suited for re‐ location programs.

Unlike other wild animals that may struggle to thrive

after being moved, skunks are better equipped to ad‐ just. They have few natural predators, eat almost any‐ thing, and are very solitary creatures.

"They don't really have friends," she said. "They have their young in the spring and they'll mate in the spring as well. But other than that, they don't really have strong social connections."

Raymond said more com‐ munities are exploring nonlethal control options for controlling urban pests, but any management program should also include public education about how to co‐ exist with skunks.

Watch | Trips and tricks for dealing with skunk spray:

Albertans should know that skunks will only create a stink if they feel truly threat‐ ened, Raymond said.

They have small reserves of spray and using it will leave them defenceless for days.

"The chemicals that they produce, they're really stinky," she said. "But the chemicals are really expen‐ sive for them to produce and so they would prefer not to use it if they have other op‐ tions."

She urges Albertans to ed‐ ucate themselves on these often unwelcome neigh‐ bours.

Spotting a skunk or get‐ ting a whiff of their telltale stench can put some people on edge, but skunks have de‐ veloped ways to coexist with us so we should do the same for them, Raymond said.

"Urban-adapted species have developed strategies to live around humans and skunks are definitely on that list," she said.

"Skunks are a species that does really well around peo‐ ple, at least from the skunk's perspective."