Striped skunks turn up across South Dakota in 91 records spread over 28 counties, from Pennington County and the Black Hills in the west to Hand, Faulk, and Brule counties on the central plains. Few mammals in the state are this evenly distributed.
An omnivore built around insects
A skunk does most of its hunting with its nose and front claws, digging out beetle grubs, crickets, and grasshoppers and leaving the small conical diggings that often give it away before it is seen. It rounds out that insect diet with mice, eggs, carrion, and fallen fruit, which lets it live nearly anywhere cover borders open foraging ground: farmyards, shelterbelts, creek bottoms, and the grassy edges of parks like Wind Cave National Park and Badlands National Park.
Slow winters, busy springs
Striped skunks do not truly hibernate, but they den up through the coldest weeks, often several sharing one burrow, and the record thins accordingly from November into December. Activity builds again from February into April, when males roam in search of mates and the breeding season puts more skunks on the move than at any other stretch of the year. Most people meet the species by smell first, a fair warning to keep distance, since a cornered skunk can throw its musk accurately for several yards after a stamping, tail-up warning.
Status in South Dakota
NatureServe ranks the striped skunk S5, Secure, in South Dakota, and the species is native to the state. USGS NAS does not list it as nonindigenous here.
Full species profile
