There's an Opossum in My Kitchen!

One evening my next-door neighbor was working at her kitchen sink when she heard
something wolfing food from the cats' dish nearby. Unaccustomed to such table
manners from her cats, she turned to find that a wild opossum had apparently pushed
open the screen door, as her cats were wont to do, and made itself at home. Wisely
waiting until the opossum had finished the cats' food, my neighbor then shooed it
outside with a broom. (If you find an opossum in your house, treat it with caution.
They have fifty large, very sharp teeth.)
Like the turkey vulture [See my vignette, "Turkey Vultures"] the opossum is a
species that was strictly southern during my youth. But it’s been spreading steadily
northward. Its range has extended into Ontario, Canada, and it’s been found farther
north than Toronto.
I had heard that opossums were in our area (Cape Ann), but my first sighting
came one night in 1993 when I put out some leftover tuna salad for my next-door
neighbor's cats. Just after retiring, I heard the bowl bumping about on the porch and
 looked through the bedroom window to see an opossum
eating the tuna salad. I rapped on the window. It merely
glanced at me, and continued eating, suggesting that it was
the same opossum that had waltzed into my neighbor's
kitchen. Or are they all so bold?
There are more than 60 different species of
opossum, often called possum. My visitor was a Virginia
opossum (Didelphis virginiana), the only marsupial in
North America. It's descended from animals so ancient
that their fossil remains date back seventy million years.
Ancestors of the opossums you may see in your backyards
roamed the Earth with the great dinosaurs.
The opossum is found in any areas with trees,
including cities. Color varies from almost white to almost black, but is most
commonly gray. The tail is a foot long, hairless, and prehensile. The opossum has a
pointed pink nose, prominent whiskers, and small black hairless ears with white tips.
Overall body length is 27-33 inches.
The opossum is an excellent climber. It forages on the ground and in the trees,
primarily at night. It does not hang by its tail from branches. It eats snakes, frogs,
mice, fish, worms, insects, eggs, fruits, nuts, and seeds, not to mention cat food and
tuna salad.
In warm climates opossums have two litters each year. Gestation is only
thirteen days. A litter can number up to twenty-five, but with only thirteen teats in the
mother's pouch, only this many can survive. The actual number leaving the pouch is
usually half that. Once out of the pouch, the young cling to the mother's back or tail.
They’re on their own by the age of four months.
It's true that
opossums feign death
when attacked, but only
as a last resort. When an
opossum senses danger
from a predator and
cannot escape, it will
bluff by sounding a nasty
growl, a horrific hiss,
salivating, and baring its
many sizeable teeth. If
the bluff fails and the
predator makes contact,
the opossum plays dead.
This may last from forty
minutes to four hours.
During this time, the
opossum lies on its side Adept tree-climbers, possums spend much time aloft. Photo Hope Ryden.
 and becomes stiff. The eyes remain
wide open and glaze over, the
opossum drools, the tongue lolls out
of the mouth, and green anal fluid
(reportedly foul smelling) may be
exuded. Feigning death may help
an opossum survive an attack,
because some predators ignore
dead prey. The musky odor of the
anal fluid may also help to repel
predators. "Playing possum" must
succeed more often than not, or
opossums would probably have long
ago become extinct.
“Playing Possum” photo from Wikipedia
Wildlife biologists have yet to
determine whether feigning death is
voluntary or involuntary. Once the threat is removed, the opossum makes good its
escape, though it may wait for about twenty minutes to make certain the predator has
left the area.
My sources (most of them universities) are divided on whether opossums
actually enter a catatonic state or merely fake it. Experiments using an electro-
encephalogram have shown that opossums "playing possum" are not in a trance or
cataleptic state, but are wide awake and ready to escape at the first opportunity. Still,
you'll find just as many sources stating that opossums enter a catatonic state; not a
conscious act of pretending, but a genetically programmed reflex action.
Nowhere have I been able to find out why predators respond as they do to the
opossum's ruse. Source after source states that this habit of defense is successful
because predators don't often attack or eat dead animals. I can understand a predator
not wanting to eat carrion, but the nose knows that a "death feigning" opossum is
clearly a fresh "kill." Possibly the anal fluid it secretes, described by one source as
musky, is enough to repel predators. It seems to work for garter snakes, and I never
found the smell all that bad.
One source even states that "playing possum' works because predators don't
always eat their prey as soon as they capture it. From the opossum viewpoint, that's a
really long shot. Another source states that predators are adapted for eating only live
animals. We’re left to assume that opossums know which animals shun dead prey.
But of course an opossum feigning death still has a heartbeat, audible to any
predator, so it's highly unlikely that predators really buy into the "dead possum" ruse.
The success of "playing possum" must relate to the sudden removal of stimuli that
keep predators attacking. For example, in childhood I was taught never to run away
from dogs, because flight provokes attack. Similarly, people attacked by grizzly bears
fare better if they crouch in a fetal position with their arms covering their heads. They
may suffer severe bites and claw wounds, but usually the bears seem to lose interest
and walk away. Of course, this behavior may succeed only because humans are not
Opossum and lizard in bush at night. Copyright holder has released this into the public domain.

among a bear's natural prey. I doubt it would work for a deer.

Although new on the scene hereabouts, opossums are more welcome
additions than skunks and raccoons. They carry fewer diseases than the average
household pet, and are more resistant to rabies than any other animal, wild or
domestic. They’re also immune to the venom of most pit vipers, and prey on these
snakes where they’re available. Scientists hope to turn the opossum's immunities to
human benefit.
By no means do opossums have exclusive rights to "playing possum." Hognose
snakes feign death when attacked. Death feigning has also been observed in turkey
vultures, ducks, rodents, and amphibians. Among the many insects, bugs and
arachnids that feign death are harvestmen (daddy long legs), blue death-feigning
beetles, harlequin bugs, most spiders, giant water bugs, at least one ant species (from
Costa Rica), and click beetles.
Speaking of bold animals (as I was at the beginning of this vignette), on 16 June
2001 I saw a woodchuck cross Route 133 and Ipswich Common in broad daylight
amidst heavy traffic. Another woodchuck often feeds outside Lobsta Land, one of my
favorite restaurants, located on a Gloucester salt marsh off Route 128 on the south side
of the Annisquam Bridge. Lobsta Land's resident woodchuck seems oblivious to the
diners who gather at the windows to watch it. The resident mockingbird isn’t so
tolerant. It attacked me once for watching it through a window.