What is a Possum?

[Tish]

Now I have seen the possums in the U.S. and quite frankly they scare me.
So come have a look at our Possums Down Under.

 

[Blessed]

They really are not scary. They will hiss and then fall over, play dead. I have them all the time in the yard. The smaller ones I just pick up by the tail, they still keep playing dead. Throw them to the next yard. They don't have dogs.

I don't worry one would hurt my dogs, more that they might kill one I have to clean up. They do not carry rabies, at least the ones here.

 

[timoc]

Now that was a really nice video to watch. Thanks Tish.

 

[Tish]

They really are not scary. They will hiss and then fall over, play dead. I have them all the time in the yard. The smaller ones I just pick up by the tail, they still keep playing dead. Throw them to the next yard. They don't have dogs.

I don't worry one would hurt my dogs, more that they might kill one I have to clean up. They do not carry rabies, at least the ones here.

Them playing dead is funny.

Now that was a really nice video to watch. Thanks Tish.

So glad you enjoyed it.

 

[squatting dog]

Only one great possum.

 

[Marie5656]

Had a late evening visit from one once

 

[Naturally]

Sadly they are not long lived.

In captivity, the oldest recorded opossum was four years and five months old. However, in the wild, opossums have a much lower life expectancy and do not commonly make it past their first year.

The oldest opossum captured in the wild was only three years old.

 

[Della]

American possums are actually opossums and maybe not quite as cute as yours down under.
we have one that seems to live beneath an old shed in the neighbors backyard. We get real excited when
we catch a sighting of her going about her mothering duties.

 

[Warrigal]

I have a brush tailed possum that visits my garden every night for the fruit supper. She, I'm assuming the feminine, is very cautious and waits till I go inside before coming down.

I have established a signal for her to know when the fruit is available. I turn on a spotlight and the back door light, flooding the back garden with light that can be seen from a distance. Then I place the fruit, in a plastic dish near the back fence while calling out, "Here Possie, Possie Possie. Something nice for Possie."

Then I walk back inside leaving the lights on. I turn out the inside lights making the house into one big hide where I can look out any window to see if she is there.

Sometime there is a second possum that I assume is a juvenile. I am unable to get a good enough view to tell whether she has a baby in her pouch.

I am very careful not to attempt to make a pet of her. It is sufficient for me to know that in the suburban wasteland a wild but harmless creature is being helped to survive.

 

[Rakaia]

In New Zealand possums are a feral pest and health hazard. They were introduced to start a fur industry which was partly successful. As a school kid I made some pocket money skinning them. They carry tuberculosis which infects cattle.

 

[Warrigal]

Sorry about that, Rakaia, but please don't blame us. It sounds like they were imported by Kiwis; or was it the British? The latter were certainly responsible for importing foxes and rabbits to Australia to provide the Bunyip aristocracy with prey for the hunt.

 

[jujube]

I had them in my attic in the first place I lived here. They're not good upstairs neighbors.

 

[Rakaia]

Sorry about that, Rakaia, but please don't blame us. It sounds like they were imported by Kiwis; or was it the British? The latter were certainly responsible for importing foxes and rabbits to Australia to provide the Bunyip aristocracy with prey for the hunt.

Yeah we'll blame the colonisers.
There's a school in the North Island which has an annual (dead) possum throwing competition. I'm sure that the PC brigade wants to stop that.

 

[lynx78]

so, from a buddy who is the Possum Whisperer....they are actually beneficial around homes to keep out and eat certain bugs, pests.....actually trapped at least 8-9 in the past year and released elsewhere in the country....nuisance in digging under houses and to me they are ugly, oversized rodents