Did You Know There Were Armadillos In Kentucky? [VIDEO]

Chad and I were talking with Nashville Kat this morning and she told us Jason Aldean is selling his hunting lodge.  She said his wife doesn't like him hunting because he had killed an armadillo.  Chad said we don't have those here in Kentucky.  WRONG!

Armadillos starting migrating from parts of Missouri and Kansas in the late 90's.  The first spotting was in 1997 at Land Between the Lakes.  They are here to stay.  Our region is actually home to the nine-banded armadillo.

In talking to several listeners everyone said they had only seen dead armadillos.  I did a little research (thank you, U.S. Department of Agriculture) and found that the reason we spot them on the side of the road is because they are burrowing animals and have a great sense of smell yet they have weak hearing and eyesight.  The sad news is, their sense of smell is finely tuned to animals and they can't smell cars!  So they routinely meet their demise on the side of the road.

The most frightening thing I learned is that a small percentage of these little critters carry leprosy.  Luckily those that carry that disease appear to live in Florida and modern hygiene and medicine combat this.  That means the risk is extremely low for catching the disease from one of these little guys.

Who knew we would learn so much this morning!