Striped skunk

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A striped skunk
Warner Bros.' Pepé Le Pew. Art by Bob Guthrie.
Stella from the animated film, Over the Edge
Sabrina (initial comic design). Art by Eric W. Schwartz
Flower skunk. Art by Dustmeat.

The striped skunk (Mephitis mephitis) is a skunk of the family Mephitidae, genus Mephitis, that occurs across much of North America, including southern Canada, the United States, and northern Mexico.

Description[edit]

Striped skunks are polygamous omnivores with few natural predators, save for birds of prey.

Stoutly built, they are short-limbed animals with a small, conical head and a long, heavily furred tail. Adult males are 10% larger than females, with both sexes measuring between 20.4 and 30.3 inches (52/77 centimeters) in total body length and usually weighing 4.0/9.9 pounds (1.8/4.5 kilograms), though some may weigh 12 pounds (5.5 kilos).

The feet are plantigrade with bare soles, and are not as broad or flat as those of hog-nosed skunks. The forefeet are armed with five long, curved claws adapted for digging, while those on the hind feet are shorter and straighter.

Fur and stripes[edit]

The color patterns of their fur vary greatly but generally consist of a black base with a prominent, thick dual white stripes extending from the head which divides along the shoulders, continuing along the flanks to the rump and tail.

Some specimens have a white patch on the chest, while others bear white stripes on the outer surface of the front limbs. Brown or cream-colored mutations occasionally occur.

Striped skunks in mainstream culture[edit]

Striped skunks are the most popular and recognizable characters in media, with examples including Pepé Le Pew from Warner Bros.' Looney Tunes, Fifi La Fume from Warner Bros.' Tiny Toon Adventures, Kicks from Animal Crossing, Flower from The Walt Disney Company's Bambi, and many others. In these depictions, they are often seen as cute and lovable.

"Aroma"[edit]

But the most common trope involving striped skunks is them having a foul, odorous smell, which stems from their self-defense spray mechanism. This trope is often pushed to them having an unbearable odor at all times (Pepé Le Pew, Johnny Appleseed, Over the Hedge's Stella the skunk, Open Season's Rosie and Maria, Cory "Cilantro" the skunk, etc), which is generally false.

Typical striped skunks will smell musty, like ferrets or other mustelids, but will not smell like they have been sprayed on.

Characters[edit]

Striped skunks and furry[edit]

Striped skunks are the most commonly chosen skunk species for the creation of furry characters/OCs, fursonas/truesona/personas, and/or fursuits in the furry fandom, with the main reason being the highly visually recognizable double tail stripe (with many designs also having a single strip, or it being all over the board [see multi-striped white tiger/striped skunk hybrid character, Zig Zag]).

Anthropomorphic female striped skunks are sometimes referred to affectionately as skunkettes. Its creation is attributed to furry artists Taral Wayne and Steve Martin (of Mauvette fame).

Some striped skunks are designed with established furry species designs, with the most prominent of them being the skunktaur. They are often associated with the flatuence fetish, eproctophilia, in media and play (i.e. fursuiting).

Furry striped skunk characters[edit]

See also[edit]

External links[edit]

Smallwikipedialogo.png Some of this page is derived from Wikipedia. The original article was at Striped skunk. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WikiFur, the text of Wikipedia is available under CC-BY-SA and the GFDL.
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