Alie Ward

Would that also warn a predator?

Like if you're a coyote walking around, you're a bobcat and you start to smell skunk, would you be like, ugh, I'm out of here.

This is like a restaurant that stinks.

I know you want more on this, so you can please report to some cozy book nook and curl up with the paper, Aversive or Attractive?

The Effects of Skunk Oil on Predator Behavior by Professor Holly Schiefebein and our own Dr. Ted out of, yes, his lab at California State Long Beach.

So this study notes that skunk carcasses have been encountered...

in which everything except the anal glands had been consumed by scavengers.

Like they were leftovers, and it notes probably coyotes, which could indicate an aversion to and avoidance of the oil contained within these glands.

But the researchers in this study, they made skunk decoys out of tanned hides, and half of them they kept black and white striped, and the other half they dyed, they bleached them, and then they paired some with the smell of skunk.

So they wanted to see if the coloration in conjunction with the smell did anything.

And the study found that scented models were less likely to be visited, indicating, yes, there was an avoidance of the oil.

But some of my favorite passages of research papers in general are always hiding out in the methodology section.

This one did not disappoint.

So they had to make over skunk pelts into a more neutral color so that they had striped ones and that they had just drab brown ones.

So the lab had to create the brown pelts

via, it says, Clarol Basic White Lightener and 40 Volume Cream Developer from Sally Beauty.

And then they dyed them brown over that using permanent hair color in the shade Dark Blonde.

And if you listen to our pinnipedology episode on seals and sea lions or our recent marmotology episode about groundhogs, you will know human hair dye is part of a mammologist's science kit more often than you would suspect.

But I want to save some skunk facts for a future episode with another years-long quest for a very specific guest.

I really need Jerry Drago of New Mexico.