Saturday, November 24, 2007

Eric makes the front page!!!!

From the 11/23/07 Edwardsville Intelligencer.....

http://www.goedwardsville.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=19052655&BRD=2291&PAG=461&dept_id=473648&rfi=6

Skunk stirs up a neighborhood
Steve Horrell, shorrell@edwpub.net
11/23/2007

The call that came in to the Edwardsville police station early Wednesday morning must have been somewhat alarming: A skunk with its head stuck in a glass pickle jar had been sighted wandering on Quince Street. It looked like a striped astronaut. Around 6 a.m. Officer Jason Forsythe drove out to the apartment complex in the 400 block of Quince to have a look.
“He was laying there and when I put my headlights on, he got up and wandered around trying to get the jar off,” Forsythe said later at the police station.
Forsythe was reluctant to intervene, and the skunk has not been found. Neighbors said that it had first been seen four hours earlier and had apparently wandered over to Quince from Cherry Street.
An Edwardsville Public Safety officer who went out to the area about 9 a.m. said she was unable to find it.
A few minutes later Eric Diekemper was raking up his 16th bag of leaves and acorns from two massive oak trees that line his front yard at 411 Plum St. Two other trees in adjoining yards added to the pile.
Diekemper said he had noticed the public safety officer’s vehicle parked on Quince street, out behind his house, but had not seen the skunk.
The Diekempers moved to Plum Street eight years ago. Since then the city has extended Plum Street south to Center Grove Road, through a heavily wooded area that still contains plenty of deer and skunk. Diekemper says he has seen several skunks on Plum Street and Relocated 159 and neighbors have seen deer.
A couple of weeks ago, Diekemper says a skunk got into trash cans that he set out next to Quince Street.
“We were debating whether to call somebody about it,” he said. “But what do you do if you catch it? Take it to the shelter or something, but you get worried about getting sprayed or something.”
Diekemper actually did get sprayed last year. “I was coming up the back door and he was by the back door, and I thought, ‘Ohhh!’ I didn’t get totally sprayed.”
Edwardsville police fielded about 80 skunk-related calls last year, and have already fielded that many so far this year. Edwardsville Police Sgt. Dennis Gunderson urged residents to make sure that trash can lids are fastened tightly and no pet food be left in the yard.
It’s been a typical year skunk-wise at Madison County Rabies Control. So far 87 skunks have been turned in to the facility, on Illinois Route 143 near Edwardsville. The skunks are then euthanized, said Dr. David Hall, a veterinarian who works for the county. “A fair number of those have been from Edwardsville,” he said.
©Edwardsville Intelligencer 2007

1 comment:

Lisa B. said...

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