THUNDER BAY — Vanessa Bowles was more afraid of being bitten than being sprayed.
A skunk had found its way to the bottom of the bowl at the skateboard park at Prince Arthur's Landing, and couldn't make its way back to the top.
Bowles was determined to extricate it humanely, explaining in an interview Monday it was obvious "this poor thing was exhausted."
The founder and executive director of the Cinema 5 Skate Park learned about the skunk's plight when she arrived Sunday morning for a weekly session with a group of youth skateboarders.
"We decided kind of at the last minute, with Ribfest going on, and it looked like it was going to rain, to move everyone back to our indoor skate park. I was literally just there making sure that parents who came knew where we were going. But then I noticed a huge commotion around the bowl."
When Bowles approached, she saw the skunk at the bottom and learned from bystanders that calls to various parties to remove it had gone unanswered.
"'We called the city, we called the MNR, no one's responding and no one's going to come get this skunk,'" she was told.
"My thoughts were that this poor thing cannot even sit. It gets hot in there. It is so hot in that bowl. It didn't look hurt, but it just looked exhausted."
A representative of Our Kids Count arrived with some blankets, and Bowles called over to the Cinema 5 Skate Park for someone to bring something to shield her legs to reduce the risk of being bitten.
A worker for the city also loaned her some puncture-resistant gloves, and offered a makeshift ramp in hopes the animal would be able to get out on its own.
"I eventually just threw a blanket over the skunk's head, picked it up, and got it onto the grass," Bowles said.
Video posted to Instagram shows her scampering up the concrete wall with the animal in her arms, then taking it to a nearby grassy area where it made a hasty exit from the scene.
She said she's previously removed a mouse as well as spiders from the bottom of the bowl.
"I'm just about showing love and compassion for humans and non-humans alike. Understanding that whatever gets trapped in there is going to need help, this was probably one of the more scary rescues that I've had to do."
Bowles said during the entire encounter the skunk didn't spray once, leaving her to speculate it had used up the content of its scent glands at some point earlier in the ordeal.
"We all just kind of moved back, and were hoping it would survive this incident. It must have been in there for a long time...A lot of people don't like skunks, but it's still an animal."
