Opossums are again being spotted around the region. Columnist says the unfamiliar marsupial may look out of place, but it’s far from a menace
The first message came from Orillia: ”You’ll never believe what I just saw waddle across Arthur Street!”
A couple of days later the second message hit our in-box: ”This thing was under our bird feeder near Hawkestone! Is it what I think it is?!”
Yes folks, opossums are indeed showing up around the neighbourhood.
These are not the first times an opossum has shown up in the region, but previous sightings have been one offs, usually with a couple of years between observations.
There was one found in Jarrett in 2013, albeit squashed in the intersection. And another road kill was noted at Orr Lake in 2025. So they are around the area, even if for only a short time.
Because they are somewhat new to our collective neighbourhood, they carry with them the stigma of being different, which for some reason quickly manifests that hard-wired emotion within us: CAUTION! ON GUARD! IT’S NEW! EVERYBODY STAY BACK!
C’mon people, you love pandas, don’t you? And koala bears? Hey, check out this cutie: soft grey, almost silver fur; black eyes and ears; and pink nose, feet and tail. I mean, really, pink? And they have thumbs … on their hind feet!
We’re not done yet … opossums are marsupials, meaning they carry their young in a pouch (like a kangaroo, kind of). What is not to love about these animals?
OK, so the naked rat-like tail is a bit off-setting, but they use their tail when climbing, as a brace. However, despite many cartoons to the contrary, an opossum does not hang upside down by its tail. Who thought that one up? Oh right … Disney. “Zip-a-dee-do-dah, zip-a-dee-aye, eh.”
Opossums eat a wide range of diet, from beetles, slugs, snails, and mice to overripe fruit, fresh compost and snakes. What is really cool, is that they eat ticks!
Yes, those ticks that are waiting for you on tall grasses, tick egg sacs laying on the ground, anywhere they find a tick, they eat it. What the heck, maybe we should be breeding them and releasing them to the great tick-infested outdoors? (Just kidding folks, just kidding!)
This diet makes them omnivorous, much like a raccoon. However, please don’t lump these two critters together as common vermin. Opossums are solitary, quiet and almost polite, whereas raccoons roam in gangs, cause mayhem around garbage cans, and generally have a superior attitude.
A big difference between raccoons and opossums is that the ubiquitous black-masked bandits hang out in family packs and neighbourhood gangs, working as a team to scour the human neighbourhood for unlocked garbage cans.
Opossums are solitary, wandering over hill and dale in search of garden bugs to eat, or June beetle larva in your lawn. Quite helpful little chaps, actually.
To take a lead from the aforementioned Disney, and should I be so bold as to anthropormorphize (is that even a real word?) and put human traits onto an animal, I would have raccoons say, “Yeah, we’re eating your garbage! What of it? Got more? Bring it!”
By comparison the opossum is demure, indeed quite Canadian: “Oh, pardon me. Sorry. Sorry. I was just cleaning up the seeds under the bird feeder. Didn’t mean any harm. Sorry. I’ll be on my way now. Sorry.” And off they waddle. Cute.
From time to time a Mister Opossum will cross paths with a Mistress Opossum and 13 days later … newborns! Yes, that’s 13 days, not weeks. The wee ones climb inside mother’s pouch and will ride and nurse there for the next four months. Few actually get to adulthood as their population is low and the list of predators is long; their average life span is a mere two years.
Should you be “lucky” enough to accidently corner an opossum, they will present to you their best drama class performance of an angry animal. Hissing, growling, snapping, baring of teeth! Oh my! Should you not flee in mortal fear, but boldly step closer to the cornered beast … it will faint. Playing ‘possum is more than just an old country saying.
As the American National Opossum Society says (yes there really is such a group), the No. 1 thing to do when you encounter a wild opossum is … nothing. Just watch in awe one of North America’s strangest mammals. And oldest too, as fossilized opossums have been discovered with dinosaur bones, dating over 70 million years ago. (No, the dinosaurs were not ‘dating’ the opossums. Yeah, they’re weird, but not that weird.)
In places where opossums are quite a bit more common than here, and enough can be rounded up for testing, two results have been determined: one is that they are resistant to almost every disease found in the wild kingdom, including rabies; and two, their intelligence level is greater than dogs, equalling pigs. (Take that, dog people.)
So I guess it made sense when Walt Kelly drew his famous cartoon of Pogo Possum, to have him speak the unspeakable, “We have seen the enemy, and they is us.” There’s a heap of knowledge and wisdom for ya!
Opossums: Embrace them (figuratively, of course) for they are here.
David J. Hawke is a freelance writer and naturalist who lives in rural North Simcoe County. He has been continuously creating weekly nature stories since 1989… and thinks that there are still many more topics to cover!