We were headed southwest to spend a long weekend at my wife’s old stomping grounds near Meade, and as we zipped along Kansas Highway 23 south of Meade, a large chunk of sod with long thick grass lying along the road caught my eye.
“Odd,” I thought, “that this chunk of sod should be here in the middle of nowhere when everything around is either new wheat or CRP.” We pretty much had the road to ourselves, so I stopped, put the shifter in “R” and backed up to get a better look at this chunk of sod. Joyce nearly turned herself inside-out getting to her camera when I announced that our chunk of sod was in fact a dead porcupine. I never considered porcupines a Kansas mammal until a couple years ago when a friend’s dog returned home with a snoot-full of quills, and I certainly never considered them to be a southwestern Kansas mammal.Since last weekend, however, I’ve talked to numerous people who have seen them most everywhere in the state. In fact, Matt Peak, Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks furbearer biologist, says they are most prevalent in southwestern Kansas, and he thinks they may even be native to our state. Now, you know me, a couple photos of the beast was not enough; I had to roll the thing around in the ditch and see how it was put together.Along those lines, let me share with you a few interesting things I learned about our friend the porcupine from my autopsy and from a little research. The word “porcupine” is from a French word meaning “thorny pig.” They are the second largest rodent in America, second only to the beaver. Porcupines mostly are nocturnal, and during the day are happiest snoozing high in the crotch of a tree. I’ll bet many of us have walked right past them, especially during the fall and winter when they’d probably look for-all-the-world like a squirrel nest in a tree. I knew porcupines had coats of long hair on their bodies, and I always assumed their quills were the same length. Not so. I could see a layer of what looked like fine fur down deeper in the hair, and when I parted the long hairs with my hands, there was a solid layer of quills covering its back.They remain somewhat flattened most of the time and can be brought erect, much the same way a tom turkey fans out its tail, when the porky feels threatened. They were about two inches long on this one, covering its back, sides and tail, but not its belly.Predators that know how to attack a porcupine will always attempt to get at its belly, which literally seems to be the chink in its armor.We also were amazed at the claws and teeth on the thing. It had long, curved claws like a badger, which I guess makes sense given their penchant for climbing trees, and it had large upper and lower incisors like those of a beaver.The soles of its feet were another interesting matter. Porcupine feet are wide and round like a smaller version of a bear’s foot and have one large pad covering the entire bottom of the foot. My sister recently saw one cross the road in front of her car, and its gait was somewhere between a shuffle and a waddle.Every two weeks, I get together with a group of old guys at the nursing home where I work to talk about “guy” stuff like tractors, combines, fishing and hunting and I knew our finding this dead porky would make a good guy topic, however, I needed some props.A porcupine’s tail is thick with quills and is sort of the business end of a porky since they use it as their weapon in a tussle, so we hacked off the tail and dropped it into a Ziploc bag along with one of its feet to show the claws and pad on the bottom.Along with those, we also procured small bags of hair and quills. So, as you read this, somewhere on a lonely stretch of highway south of Meade lies a porcupine cadaver missing the tail, one foot and small tufts of hair and quills — probably the result of some sort of weird ritual wouldn’t you guess? ... Continue to Explore Kansas Outdoors!P.S.: If you ever happen upon a baby porcupine, the correct word is “porkupette.” (Really)Steve Gilliland is a syndicated outdoors columnist and can be contacted by e-mail at stevegilliland@idkcom.net.
