Have any good porcupine stories?
I was walking with Hazel along our normal
nature trail during the late afternoon on December 31. She was gadding about the woods while I ambled along the trail, lost in my own thoughts. Suddenly, I heard her bark, the bark of a dog that has found a fellow creature with whom to interact. Racing toward her, I saw she was attempting to go after a large porcupine. She was across a frozen brook that I could not cross, and she was not readily responding to my please to return. Finally, after at least three attempts to bite to poor porcupine (I say “poor”, but I’m sure it doesn’t even h
ave a scratch), Hazel finally came back over the stream...with a face full of quills. Now she became the “poor” thing. I pulled out a few but could quickly see that help was needed. A quick iPhone woodland internet search showed that, unless it is just a few quills, pulling them out is a fool’s game and a vet is the recommended destination. Being late afternoon on a Saturday New Year’s Eve, no regular vets were open, so it was off to the emergency clinic. Thankfully, that was only 16 miles away. Unfortunately, it is an emergency clinic, which means they charged me over $400 to sedate, pluck, and prescribe antibiotics for her. I was glad they were there, but I think the fees they charge approach price gouging; they are taking advantage of animal-crazy fools like me in a time of crisis.
I also learned that quills can be fatal. I read about a cougar that died weeks after an encounter because quills in his chest worked their way into his lungs.
Anyway, Hazel is back to normal, though a few small keratin quills that have travelled from inside her nose continue to pop out of her snout, and I am being careful about when and where to walk her, and how tuned in I need to be. It seems porcupines come out in the evening, so whenever dogs encounter them, it is most likely to be when the veterinarians are closed.