“Most carnivores would not pass up a meal of porcupine.”

This one sentence from The Nature of Southeast Alaska says more than I really want to fathom about the world.

My favorite other carnivore and I have only encountered one live porky on our walks so far, but over the winter Cedar brought me a few souvenirs –including one quill in her lower gum–from maybe the same porky we watched a few months earlier.

Porky parts, compliments of our trusty (?) retriever

According to neighbor Molly (and the new contender, sorry Mom, for most faithful reader), this poor porkster was done in by an eagle. If it’s the one I think it is (was), its life accomplishments included “girdling” and killing a nice ornamental pine in the yard where it met talons.

Turns out these funny looking pot-bellied waddlers may be the dominant herbivores in the nearby woods. Apparently, that domination is sponsored by its incisor teeth.

Again from The Nature of Southeast Alaska, about the rodent family of beavers, porcupines, and hoary marmots:

A rodent could be defined, with apologies to kangaroo rats and other racy exceptions, as a plump and visually unimpressive body designed to transport a truly impressive set of curved, chisel-tipped, ever growing, self-sharpening incisors. The incisor has been for rodents what gunpowder was for European invaders of the new world.

O’Clair, Armstrong, Carstensen, The Nature of Southeast Alaska, 1997

Well, even gunpowder backfires sometimes. I have learned a few interesting factoids about these dudes (and porkettes), though. First, of course, you’re wondering how on earth they mate, right? The Nature of Southeast Alaska calls it a “brief but spectacular” event, but gives no salacious details. Luckily (?) the Alaska Dept. of Fish and Game edges us closer to porky porn (sorry, Mom).

Males seeking receptive females expand their home ranges up to five times the normal size. If more than one male shows interest in the same female, they will fight for the opportunity to mate with the female. Males use their incisor teeth and quills when fighting, and usually the largest and heaviest male wins. The breeding male then splashes the female with urine. If she is not ready to mate, she shakes off the urine and leaves. If she is ready, she stays and the male mounts in the traditional posture with the female in front and the male in the rear. She will curl her tail over her back, covering most of the quills.

North American Porcupine (Erethizon dorsatum) , Alaska Department of fish and Game Website

So, old Erethizon D. gets it started with a golden shower, and apparently a girl or two likes that. Who knew? They want to get it right, though, because they only make one baby per year and have a crazy-long gestation period (7 months). Maybe that explains why she only covers “most of the quills.”

But back to not passing up the meal. Should you find yourself famished in our neighborhood, you may want to do as fishers and wolves do, circling it, biting its nose repeatedly, and then flip when ready, and…it’s bon apetit from the underside.

Besides their quills (which I’ve learned some folks capture for art by making contact with styrofoam boards) porkies have a few more tricks up their sleeveless sleeves. And this may be of value to my carnivore. After flashing a “rosette” of quills under their tails, they also emit a chemical from under their skin that The Nature of Southeast Alaska describes as “a mixture of strong, unwashed human body odor, marijuana and coconut.” That ought to either trigger flight, or a nose vacation not unlike a trip to a beach in Mexico. We’ll see.

And you knew I’d get to Shakespeare, to make my not-so-gracious exit from this one. Looking at this porkster’s little “fingers,” I couldn’t help but feel a bit of empathy for this fellow as Hamlet did looking at the skull of the old jester, Yorick. That, and I don’t really want to dwell too long on what the next porky post may entail.

Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow
of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath
borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how
abhorred in my imagination it is! my gorge rims at
it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know
not how oft. Where be your gibes now? your
gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment,
that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one
now, to mock your own grinning? quite chap-fallen?

Hamlet, ACt V, sc. i