Oh, How Sweet.....

their little faces are.  The other end...not so much.  I've never been sprayed though, knock on wood.  These little guys are in front of my studio.  I was laying down on the path, trying to get a picture of the path lights without using my strobe.  I heard a little chirping, whirring noise to my left, and when I turned my head there they were!  The two in the foreground are babies and you can see the mother's tail in the upper left of the photo. 

Although people think I'm crazy, I adore skunks.  I vastly prefer them to the raccoons, which trash my garden on a regular basis.  The skunks never trash, they just dig gently around the plants in search of bugs to eat.  They never disturb the roots, they just dig out the nasty things that might be eating the roots.  I sort of think of them as my little garden helpers. 

And there is another bonus to having skunks around.  Put up a few signs that read 'warning: skunks in area' and you never have to worry about unwanted nocturnal human 'visitors' again!