One spoilt possum!!

This little fellow knows where to get a good feed...and has a good appetite too...so far tonight one large sugar banana and 3/4 of an orange...and still going....good job it's not every night...she'd eat me out of house and home!!!

Such a cutie! Your possums are so much nicer-looking than ours. The ones here are pale grey with long snouts and a hairless rat-like tail. Fearless, almost agressive, with lots of teeth. A few nights ago I absent-mindedly left the top off one of the compost bins, and next morning a possum was inside feasting on tangerine rinds. Last fall a stray cat wandered into my yard and died. I went to collect newspaper and a garbage bag. When I got back, a possum was chewing away on the carcass. Ugh!

Yuska

Much cuter. Mine and Yuska's are the same. Eeewww, we had a dead squirrel up the road and something finally ate it where it lay. I thought feral cat, but now I wonder. Eeewww.

Hi Yuska and Billy....I had a good chuckle at your possum descr..how about you post a pic of yours,would love to see and compare lol!!!

I don't have any. Wish I had taken some when we had cat food out all night for feral cats. We don't do that anymore! Their pink feet look disgustingly cold when they're out in the snow, and they have 50 teeth! Maybe Yuska has a picture.

fifty teeth? wow lol!!

Never seem to have the camera at hand when one shows up. They're mostly nocturnal but sometimes hang around for a little while in the mornings. The babies are kinda cute when they ride on mama's back.

This site has a few pictures:

http://www.opossumsocietyus.org/opossum_photo_page.htm

They are cute..in their own way,ours here usually only have one baby at a time.Love the pic of the babies on mums back. Are they mainly carrion eaters yuk !! or do they have a varied diet.and do they only show their 50teeth when they're in an aggressive mood Lol!

I'd call them omnivores - they eat any and every thing. The ones in those pictures must be in the southeastern U.S. group. They are darker than the ones here, which are a light gray. The "fur" is sparse and wiry. They show little or no fear of humans...if I encounter one in the yard it will just stand and stare at me. Sometimes orphans are created when builders bulldoze an area for new housing. A baby attached itself to the cowling on my car, and I drove to a vet's office to get help in taking it off. There are rescue groups for the animals, and the volunteers have warned us not to try to handle them as they do bite! As for the babies, I've only seen one per mama here.

In growing season, I sometimes need to put netting around my tomato cages. They also relish the tangerines - they beat me to a goodly portion of the crop.

Be glad you don't have skunks.

Put out cat food and you'll get skunks, possums and raccoons. We had a small lawn shed plasticed over with a small dorrway for feral cats to hide in the winter. A skunk went in. DH had to go to work and didn't know how he was going to get it out. I did. After he left I got an old metal pan out of the garage, put a small piece of newspaper in it, lit it and pushed it in the hole after the fire went out. As soon as it smoked, the skunk came ambling out. I then bricked up the entrance.

Our possums are truely ugly. Someone here has one for a pet and they are a lot better looking when they are taken care of.

Fearless is right! I was on the porch at dusk when one came up the driveway. Boy did it hiss at the cats! Scarrrreyyyy!

I have just found this thread . Possums are absolutely hated here in NZ -they were introduced into our pristine environment ,and now number in the millions ,adapting to town ,country, or forest .... At our former home they clambered on to the roof and a couple of times they fell down the chimney into the living room ,where they would then panic ,and their sharp claws shredded curtains and furniture ,until we managed to whack them out the open door with a broom .They are nocturnal .Hubby has a trap , which kills them instantly (sorry to any sensitive readers !) and in a sort of rough justice ,buries them in the garden where they improve the soil .They indeed eat everything- especially roses ,as well as fruit (they peel the citrus and leave a little pile of peels under the trees ) they destroy our native forests by eating the tips ot trees .You shouldn't have got me started !
Emelle .

It is truly tragic when a foreign specie invades an area where it has no natural predator controls. The tree snakes that devoured all the birds on Guam are just about the worst ever IMO.

I wonder where/how these possums originated. The two types are noticeably different in appearance and location, yet both are marsupial and nocturnal.

Yuska

Emelle, do you have the ugly ones like ours or the cuter ones like Brical1's?

Yuska, I wondered the same thing.

The possums here certainly won't win any beauty contests! The one in Brical's pic is kinda cute - Emelle, what color are the ones in your area? On our trip to New Zealand, we didn't see any live ones, but someone pointed out some stuffed ones in a display case and they appeared to be brown.

A couple of immigrants here have caused some problems - the armadillo drifted north from South and Central America and is a pest in some areas. With its armored body it looks prehistoric. Also nocturnal, it roots for grubs with its snout and can really tear up a lawn overnight. Far worse, though, are fire ants. The multiple stings literally feel like one's body is on fire, and the itching is unbearable. They're continuing their movement on north and are now being seen in southern Oklahoma.

Yuska, I've heard of the northward march. I hope they don't make it this far. We're lucky to not have pests like that.

Fire ants were found in a corner of Auckland airport ,but the news was kept very quiet ! I have heard nothing since ,so here's hoping !
The possums round here are shaded grey- brown -I never thought of them being 'cute ' .Travelling over to the Hawkes bay ,it was very noticeable that the possums over there were nearer to black ....How you know ,is the sight of hundreds of them hit by cars on the road .You would have noticed them Tuska ...
In the Rotorua gift shops they have Trophy boards ---possum fur stretched over a trophy board with car tire marks through it - revolting ,but the Japanese tourists buy them up because they think it is funny !
Emelle

This message was edited Mar 15, 2007 1:24 PM

Fire ants. I know everything has a purpose on earth, but I'm ashamed to say there are a few I wish could be wiped out.

Goes to show there's something for everyone, but not me :))

Our possums, raccons and skunks are starting to wake up and become road kill here.

Brical1, your baby is cute. Looks like it luvs to have a picture taken.

:) Donna

The Virgina Opossum is what we have in the states. We have one for a pet. Have had her now for 2 years. She is a sweetie. The fur is soft and full. They have 80 teeth, more than any other mamal in N. America. Ours is a female named Jolie' Pas. It means not beautiful in Cajun French. She will not bite. They are not agressive.

Hi Cajun,

I was on a thread long ago and someone had a pet possum. They walked her on a leash and took her everywhere. I was suprised at how healthy the fur of a pet is, compared to the wild ones. They are almost pretty.

For those who want to see the North American possum.

Yep, that's our possum. Good picture!

I think with the N. American Opossums they're generally passive and mainly the "aggressive" ones are females with new babies. I found one when I lived in an apartment building up north many years ago. There were stray cats we used to feed and would let sleep in the hallway on very cold winter nights. Got home from work one night and saw hair at the top of the stairs on the blanket I had laid out. The stray cat "Sly" came up behind me, so I was wondering, "what the heck is that?" Was an opossum just like the one in Farmerdill's picture. It scampered away past me and waddled down the stairs. Scared the heck out of me.

The Australian version is much cuter, I'll admit. But even the American one is a marsupial, the only one I know of on this continent.

This message was edited Jun 17, 2007 5:01 PM

BillyPorter

That was me with our possum. I can't get to those pictures right now because of computer problems. I'll try to get some more of Jolie' for everyone to enjoy. We entered her in the fair exhibits this past week and she won 1st place. She really does have her own charm. Looks aren't everything. LOL

Thank you Donna ...haven't seen it for a while but son was feeding ita couple of nights ago and said she had a baby on her back so will post pics when I can ...

yes !!please post pics of your pet possum cajun...we would all love to see,thanks also farmerdill ...good pic

Cajun, it will be nice to see pictures of her again. 1st place, how cool is that!

Brical1, I look forward to seeing baby pictures too!