Skunk raises a stink in Gillam grocery store

Gillam's only grocery store was visited by a stinky intruder early Wednesday morning.

Karen Donnellan-Fisher, the general manager of the Gillam Co-op, said a skunk got into the store around 6 a.m. 

An employee was in the store and saw the striped stranger out of the corner of her eye.

"She promptly jumped and ran the heck out of the store," Donnellan-Fisher said.

The staff called a local conservation officer for help.

The officer told staff the critter could have come inside to escape the rain or climbed into a pallet that was moved into the store. 

Getting the skunk out proved to be difficult.

"We laid down the trap and baited him with sardines, which is supposedly something they're attracted to," Donnellan-Fisher said.

The smelly suspect wouldn't be moved, though. The traps stayed empty for most of the day.

He had gotten into some bread in the back of the warehouse and he ate very well.- Karen Donnellan-Fisher

"We had to make the decision to close the store because we couldn't take the chance he would come out and spray any of the staff," Donnellan-Fisher said.

She was worried the intruder might not be found.

"My fear was that what if he didn't come out, what if we didn't catch him? How long were we going to be able to do that? Would we be able to open the store if we didn't know where he was? Shop at your own risk kind of thing," she said.

Overnight, after having a snack in the warehouse, the skunk went into the trap and had a dessert of sardines.

"He had gotten into some bread in the back of the warehouse and he ate very well," Donnellan-Fisher said.

The conservation officer arrived early Thursday to find the pungent prisoner asleep in a trap and took it out without a problem.

Donnellan-Fisher isn't sure what happened to the nocturnal critter, but said staff took the opportunity to thoroughly sanitize the store before reopening.

Something to laugh about after tense summer

Donnellan-Fisher said the rogue skunk was inconvenient, yes, but a funny distraction after what's been a difficult summer for the town, about 750 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg.

RCMP officers and military personnel descended on Gillam and the surrounding area during the Canada-wide manhunt for accused killers Bryer Schmegelsky and Kam McLeod.

The bodies of the two men, suspects in three deaths in B.C., were found near Gillam earlier this month, following a weeks-long search for the fugitives.

"With everything we've gone through up here in Gillam this summer, as much as it wasn't … great to not be able to get into the food store, it was something humorous we could at least laugh about," Donnellan-Fisher said.