Being slow moving animals, they can not catch the more active animals and birds as do the other members of the weasel family and their food consists mainly of mice, insects and grubs, also of the eggs and young of such birds as nest on the ground. They are very fond of poultry and frequently visit the poultry houses, killing the young birds. They also feed on carrion. When they can get it they will eat almost any kind of animal food. Even in the wild state the skunk is not, strictly speaking, a carnivorous animal as they will eat and in fact are fond of sweet corn when in a milky state, also sweet potatoes, melons and wild fruits. It appears that if the male skunk is not separated from the female at breeding time, the female will kill the male, presumably to protect her young. And on the other hand the male will kill and eat the young if given the chance.
Robert B. Phillips relates the following in H-T-T:
"I wish to relate an experience with the lowly skunk. I found some skunk signs near an old cave large enough for a small boy to creep in. I set one trap near the main entrance and another one about fifteen feet away both fastened to clogs. (I wish to state before I go farther that the cave has a sickening sulphur smell and in the winter time, no matter how deep the snow is elsewhere, you will not find any for about three feet around the mouth of the cave.) Well I visited the traps the next morning and upon arriving at the cave I saw two skunks about twenty feet from the hole. One was eating at the hind quarters of the other. Of course I thought they were both in my traps, but when about forty feet away the victorious skunk saw me and started climbing an embankment below the cave and I noticed he did not have a toe pincher clinging to him. The skunk was only two feet from his dwelling when I made a quick shot with a twenty two rifle. Of course I missed so I knew he was gone for the time being. I went to the other one and found him breathing his last. He had his entire tail, scent glands and the meat all eaten off the bones at the junction of the hind legs and the base of the backbone. In fact the hole in the body was so large that a full sized baseball could be put into the abdomen and the skunk still had a little life in him yet. Neither of them had thrown their scent.
"Two days later I caught the other one, the largest male skunk I ever caught. When I went there he was leisurely eating a rabbit he had evidently caught. This happened in the beginning of December and both were male skunks.
"I know of another case where skunks turned Cannibalistic. This happened to some young trappers who were in the habit of catching the skunks in September and early October and keeping them until they were prime. They had eight or nine in an old spring wagon. One morning he went out to see them and found they had killed and eaten one of their own number. There are a few of those fellows around here. They are afraid another fellow might catch one or two of them.
"One time I caught a skunk and I got quite near it kept on digging in the leaves and every once in a while it would unearth a bug or insect which it would promptly devour. Some people have an idea that a skunk does nothing but steal chickens. This he does sometimes, but he makes up for that by catching cut worms and other insects which spoil thousands of dollars worth of crops annually. I have opened their stomachs already and found centipedes and angle worms and lots of beetles in them. Skunk also loves mice."
Breeding.
Earl Williamson says:
"I see in the H-T-T where persons have found skunk dens with nearly all female skunks. My experience has been that in every den there is one male and two or more females; twenty-two being the highest I have ever heard of being taken from one den. The females and male den up early while the rest travel around in nice weather and stay in any hole in bad weather."
Says a Nebraska trapper: "I have seen from 2 to 12 skunk in one den, but never more than 1 male with a den of females. The males of a litter seem to be forced to leave, only one remaining. The males so treated den themselves individually at a distance from the herd of females, returning in the spring. I have never known them to use their odor in a fight among themselves, neither have I known them to make a noise other than patting on the ground with their front feet."