How a fur craze led to skunks being introduced into P.E.I.
CBC
Skunks are so prevalent in P.E.I., Islanders may be surprised they weren't always here.
Though the Island is a perfect habitat for the little critters, they didn't migrate before the land bridge that connected the province to the mainland disappeared.
In fact, skunks were introduced into P.E.I. only about a century ago by humans looking to make a quick buck.
The reason why anyone would want to import what most people today would consider a pest is linked to two things: red foxes and the world of high fashion.
"We had no skunks, but we had foxes. And the red fox has a mutant strain ... that produces black fox fur," UPEI history professor Ed MacDonald said.
"And in the late 1800s, because it was so rare and because the fur was so beautiful and glossy and the black fur had silver guard hairs, slightly longer hairs, and those guard hairs gave the black fox a silver sheen, that was the acme of fashion."
Charles Dalton and Robert Oulton were two entrepreneurial men looking to get some of that money, and they managed to do on the Island what no one had been able to before — they convinced the foxes to breed in captivity.
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