Skunk Feeder Follow-up

The semester is over, and our two student groups working on automatic skunk feeders have delivered their final work and manuals. (Although they’ll be getting us some updates in January). Both teams scrambled the first half of December to get their projects functional, safe, and mounted. There’s still some tweaking to work through, but we’re really happy with how the semester has gone and the products we have gotten to help us care for Florian (and other animals). Check outRead more

Working with Duke Students

We’ve been working all semester with engineering students at Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering. Two student teams challenged themselves to take on the project of making an automatic feeder for Florian our Skunk. Work has been going on behind the scenes since August, but after the Thanksgiving break prototypes will be going up in Florian’s home. We’re very excited to see what has been designed for us and we are hopeful that this will improve Florian’s life here with us.Read more

What you missed while we were away, Part 3

I’m not sure I can continue to use this header, but for now, it seemed appropriate: This past June, I said goodbye to my flip phone, and entered the modern era of Smart phones. You first learned of this in my Christmas 2016 post.  This past October, I not only got a video of Florian, but was able to send it to the Keepers. It was the first time anyone had seen Florian climbing, or walking on his platforms andRead more
1 Comment

Florian Drinks

I was in Carolina Wildlife the other day checking on the animals and noticed our skunk Florian was awake. He was drinking his water in a most unusual way. He dipped his hands in the water and would bring them back and drink the water that collected on the back of his hand. Reminds me of how Mimi the bear likes to eat her grapes.      Read more
1 Comment

Welcome to our new Skunk

Meet Florian, our five-year old striped skunk (formerly known as hunk-the-skunk who was rescued by CLAWS). Florian, meaning “Flower” in Latin, is the first skunk we’ve had here since Flower, our old female skunk, died over 10 years ago. (She was well-loved and it seemed appropriate to have him named after her). CLAWS had Florian since December, when a home was needed for him after his last location. The folks at CLAWS worked long and hard to get some weightRead more