Porcupine,Good? Bad? or Just Ugly?

[sherwood]

Tom,
I have heard they crave salt or anything they think tastes like
salt. Heard they would chew handles of tools for the taste
of perspiration or the salt in it.

[Tom]

That, and being real hungry would make them eat all kids of stuff, eh?  

I wonder..................

If they are a threat to trees, maybe the Forestry Service should consider an Rx or remedy that would include placing  salt blocks throughout the woods.  They could be drawn further and further away from populated areas and lots of animals would enjoy the salt blocks,  deer, buffalo, elk, moose, squirrels.  An enterprising young hunter could probably figure out just where his game would most likely be if he volunteered his services to maintain the blocks.

[Kirk_Allen]

They love the flavor of the glue in plywood, pressboard etc.  As far as hoses go, I know that they will eat through ignition wires in seconds on an ATV. Not sure why but they eat hoses but I have had several sets chewed away while in Alaska.  

We would keep several sets of plug wires in our cabin just for this reason.  

[SwampDonkey]

You know the white wall on your tires ? Well we were tenting on a woods landing away from mature trees and I heard this chewing at night. I go out with the flash light and look under the pickup and the *DanG thing was chewing the white wall. I drove it away. The next day I walked up the road and found and old hose where the porkies have been feedin on. Under the rubber part was the steal reinforcement. Probably a hydrologic hose, real healthy eh?  

eh? eh? that's the maritimer closing phrase.  eh?  

[Frickman]

I must say I'm learning alot about this topic. Our biggest pest with equipment is squirrels and chipmunks. Leave a truck parked for the weekend and they take up housekeeping under the hood.

[Tom]

I don't know what to do with chipmunks but I sure do squirrels.
They make a good breakfast if you fry'em and serve with an egg and grits.
................and biscuit.  

[Percy]

Im of the "Letem Live" camp but they love to eat rubber around here and can be quite a pest.

TRUE PORKYPINE STORY
In the mid  eighties, things were happenin around here. Everyone was workin, there was logging, sawmills, pulp mills. If you wernt workin, you were sick, rich, or lazy. Anyhow one logging outfit, Cedar River Timber, had a one particular buckerman, Reg Beckley, that just hated porkypines. The guy had alot of seniority and it was his job to drive the pickup with the loaderman (Dave Toop) always riding shotgun.Whenever Reg seen a porkypine, he'd do his best to run it over and kill it. This one particular morning while driving to work, they come around a rock bluff on the logging road. It was still dark, but getting light enough to see shapes. Well Reg spots this big black spot in the road up ahead and yells "Porky!!". He stomps down on the throttle and heads strait for the helpless black mass in the middle of the road. At the last second, Dave puts both hands on the dashboard and yells out "Reg, thats not a ".......... Too late. Reg slammed into a great big rock that had rolled off the bank during the night. Took the front axle right off of the fairly new 4X4 and placed it right next to the rear axle. Kinda looked like a tandem drive pickup. They musta been makin good money back then cause the owner of the outfit, Wilf Haugland, just laffed his guts out when he heard about it....

[Kevin]

I haven't checked but their teeth probably grow continuosly like the beaver and chewing is necessary to keep them from getting too long.

[Frickman]

He had to laugh, getting mad wouldn't helped any.

[Tom]

Kevin,
I didn't know that.

I have just gotten a good excuse to eat another meal a day.  thanks.   My wife said I was gettin' a little long in the tooth.

[Ron Scott]

Don't kick a Porky when you have rubber boots on, especially your new hip boots.