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There's a possum on our porch!!

3K views 15 replies 13 participants last post by  AngusFangus 
#1 ·
:eek:

Kevin was just walking the boys and saw him up there, checking things out. He poked his head back in to tell me, because I live for wildlife alerts and he knows this. I went to look and sure enough, he was shuffling down the steps. He went under the bushes. Now I'm askeered he'll go to the back yard! :eek:

It reminds me of our New Year's Eve possum. We stayed home that year. Angus was just about five months old, and I didn't want to leave him for long.

Sometime around midnight we took Angus out back to go potty. He went to the far corner of the backyard, and suddenly we heard, "OOooooOOOoooo!" and saw Angus BEELINING back for the house, ears back, tail tucked. He was visibly shaken when he reached the deck, and continued to look in the direction from whence he came, saying, "OooooOooooO!"

It scared the willies out of me. What in the world? We got a flashlight, and there he was. A HUGE, ancient possum, sitting on our fence.

Once we saw what it was, we got a very big laugh out of Angus' impersonation of Mr. Chicken. :D

And that is how Angus came to be known as The Cowardly Lion, and eventually our Dandy Lion. :)
 
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#12 ·
Funny story. Such bravery!! Maybe he needs to see the Wizard. lol
We have lots of possums around here and they are by far not aggressive UNLESS cornered and they will bite to defend themselves. I picked one up out of our garage once, not thinking, and put it outside. It came around frequently to be fed (which I did) Here is an interesting bit of possum info. Did you know that:
Possums are North America's ONLY marsupial and are carried in the pouch for 2-3 months old then on her back for 1-2 months when they leave their den. That's why you will see a dead adult possum and babies dead close by on the roads sometimes.

They will hiss and growl and show their 50 teeth when threatened but would rather run away then be in a confrontation and never attack but fall into the dead like state we call playing possum

They are one of the shortest living animals for their size rarely making it past 3 years old due to them being easy prey for larger animals

And this is the saddest part, over 90% of the young never make it to 1 year old because of humans, other animals, cars etc.

I guess the last fact is probably why I like them so much. Plus they have cute little pointy faces. A friend of mine had one for a pet and it was very mellow. It didn't care about being handled or petted much but never bit anyone.

Ok so that's my science lesson for today. Sorry to hijack the thread.
 
#15 ·
Might as well tell another possum story...
First of all let me say that we live very near a large lake, which is surrounded by undeveloped land owned by the Army Corps of Engineers. Lots and lots of woods, sooo...lots of wildlife too.
A couple of years ago when I went out into our garage (door was open) I saw a grey furry thing out of the corner of my eye. I did my best "Shoo! Go on, Git!" hoping to chase it out the garage. Well apparently it doubled back on me and quickly hid. Saw it again a few days later and realized it was a possum.
I then decided to make it my mission to find this rascal.
As I was up on a ladder, moving boxes of Xmas decorations and whatnot, my hand found some fur...where there really shouldn't be anything made of fur. HMMM, I said. Methinks I have found him.
Sure enough, I carefully got the box down and looked inside, and there was our juvenile possum, playing possum of course.
We closed the box and took him to a park over by the lake and let him go in the woods.
I expected him to race out of the box when we opened it, "Free at last!", but he had to be litterally dumped out onto the ground. And even then he just sat there, with his mouth agape, staring at us. Then finally, without a care in the world, he mosied on into the woods.

I know, not near as funny as Angus running, tail tucked, looking back over his shoulder saying "Oh, Nooooh". THAT, we'll never forget.
 
#16 ·
Poor little possum! I felt so sorry for him. But at the same time, I was glad it was Kevin who had touched him and not me. :eek:

You should have seen us trying to figure out how to get the possum in a box. He was a fearsome-looking thing, with his mouth all wide open, kind of hissing at us.

When we let him out of the box at the lake, we all just sat there and looked at each other for the longest time. It really is true about them freezing. He didn't move a muscle.

We have rescued and relocated a pretty good assortment of critters. They seem to just love our front porch and our garage.
 
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