Meet Prickly Pete. He’s just two weeks old, or so, and a bit overwhelemed. A lot has happened in his two weeks on earth. He was born, he was PIT-tagged, photographed, held, and cooed over. Then it happened all over again (minus the being born and PIT tagged bit) a week later. We found this guy right where he was supposed to be: at the base of a tree with his mom, Helga. Helga rambled away as we approached, leaving Pete very well hidden and protected under some deadfall, about the same color as him. The second time we found him, he was tucked neatly into a partially hollow tree, again with deadfall hiding him from prying eyes. If we had not been looking for a porcupette, we would never have known he was there.
Statistically, Pete doesn’t have a very good chance of making it. Last year’s batch of radioed porcupettes yielded two survivors out of 16. Fishers are quite good at finding and devouring tasty little bundles of ‘pette, despite the good hiding spots, the camouflage and the splinter-like quills. This will be heartbreaking to the kids who held him, should it happen. As for Pete, I wonder about his perception of the world is, and what he thinks of the human sound “aaawwwwwwwww”. He must think it is the only sound we make.
Porcupine Chronicles 
D. Wortman said,
May 11, 2013 at 9:00 pm
Awwwwwwwwwwwww!
Mom
hooliedingle said,
May 11, 2013 at 9:07 pm
Patricia, Gonzalo and Santi…. This is a baby porcupine in Wisconsin. Finding porcupines and measuring them and putting ID chips in their necks is my daughter’s job. She works at a wildlife preserve and she helps the scientists study wild animals. She also teaches children and students about wild animals and nature. The place is called Sandhill Nature Preserve in Babcock, Wisconsin. I think that they have a website. Those are her hands in the orange gloves. Porcupines live in Pine trees and eat the bark. They live in the northern United States. They are covered with long sharp spines. Isn’t he cute? Deanne