These drawings are illustrations for my father’s story, Stinky, about the life of a young female striped skunk surviving in the wild. A naturalist and an educator, my father sought to inspire an appreciation for nature in the children who read it - or who have it read to them. Nearly five decades after my father’s death, I was inspired to illustrate it, and my brother and I published it.
Over three seasons Stinky explores her landscape and encounters a variety of other beasts in her quest to survive - prey, predators, and fellow survivors. The animals are what I drew.
The illustrations are meant to honor my father, Edward E. Clay.
"Stinky...gingerly sampled the air with the black tip of her nose."
"...who wouldn't be glad to own so beautiful a fur coat?"
"...Bobtail was getting too close for comfort."
"Relieved, Stinky realized it was only a harmless black-crowned night heron hunting for frogs and fish."
"Across the creek crouched Masker, the raccoon, who had just struck and missed a small trout."
"Atop the swaying cattails perched many re-winged blackbirds."
"One day the dawn found Stinky...hidden in a certain tree, an oak.
"...big jays squawked a warning to the other birds..."
"Bouncing up and down, her tail held high, Stinky's body twisted into a U-shape.."
"{a} dozen ducklings had been attacked without warning by snapping turtles, like a flotilla of ships attacked by submarines."
"Stinky had a new and permanent home."
"...tumbling, falling, and scrambling over each other, came the little stripers"
"...the mother quail froze in fear, and then, with a quick running start, flew into a nearby tree."
"There were so many bugs to eat, they did not bother with the big toad they met on the meadow."
"...the meadow was well stocked with mice."
"So the owl struck, its talons sinking like sharp razored spikes into the back of its prey."