Porcupine Banquet

Might you have a porcupine at your house enjoying the taste of its wood siding? I ask because I am wondering where she headed after her meal at our home one day last spring. A few days before, I actually had noticed a large, chewed area on a low windowsill and questioned how it had happened. This particular evening, we were watching the PBS News Hour at the far side of the house, when I heard decidedly loud gnawing. Grabbing a flashlight, I suspected whoever the culprit had been, he/she was back at it. I beamed my flashlight through the window and saw a big, black, quilly porcupine completely unfazed by the beam of my light, happily chewing just a foot away.

What ensued was a discussion between my husband and myself about how to safely discourage this behavior. Douse her with water? Chase her with a broom? Throw tennis balls at her. Instinctively, I saw the advantage of having a pane of glass between us and our intruder. Porcupine vision is poor, but by pulsing the beam through the window and shouting loudly, “Go, go, go!”, she slowly dropped down, turned, and waddled away. Her backside was even larger, blacker, and more quilly.

So, I have proceeded to read up on our uninvited visitor and will share with you some of what I learned.

Food. The diet of a porcupine varies by season: buds and young leaves in the spring, leaves of preferred trees and herbaceous plants in the summer, plus fruit and nuts in the fall. In winter the inner bark of trees, twigs, buds and needles are eaten and a few trees may be visited day after day. But why was she chewing on the windowsill of our house? The answer is salt. Spring is the peak of a porcupine’s salt craving, particularly for adult females who are losing sodium through lactation, and most paints contain salt.

Body. A porcupine’s body is covered with 30,000 quills from head to tail. With these sharp barbed needles to defend their stocky, short legged body, porcupines move at a relaxed pace. Their eyes are tiny and they are nearsighted. Porcupines do not hibernate, but sleep in and stay close to their dens in winter. The quills are used for defense, but also insulate their bodies in winter. While they do not shoot their quills to protect themselves, when threatened the quills stand up and are easily detached from the body.

Life Cycle. Porcupines have a relatively long life expectancy, with some reaching 30 years of age. Mating occurs in the fall and a single porcupette is born about 7 months after mating. Female porcupines provide all parental care. For the first two weeks the young rely on their mother for sustenance. After this they learn to climb trees and start to forage. They are fully weaned after 4 months.

So, to conclude, this brief study indicates that it was the salt in the windowsill’s paint that led a lactating female porcupine to choose our house for her meals. I also learned that while they look ferocious, they are pretty harmless, unless attacked. Water, tennis balls, a broom or a pulsing flashlight would all have encouraged her to move on. But where to…? Do let me know if she has showed up at your house.

If you have pictures and/or special stories about wildlife encounters to share, please send them to us at the Blog.