The tail of a possum

[FenceFurniture]

Errrr, better make that "tale".

There are numerous possums around here - Brushies and Ringies. One particularly Brushie doesn't just visit to forage, THIS IS HIS PATCH MAN!

Six or eight months ago I locked him out of the shed roof. The possum pee on the machinery was getting a bit much (even though much of it is anodised aluminium).

So then he went under the house, up into the wall cavity and would scratch around at 5am while he tried to excavate a larger bed for himself.

A couple of rocks to plug the hole that he used to get under the house fixed that.

Then I started noticing grit dropping from the disused chimney behind my desk. It took a while for the penny to drop, but eventually my dopey brain worked out that it always seemed to happen around the same time, but that the time was ever incrementally shifting. The time was indeed 30 minutes after sunset. One evening when I wasn't concentrating so hard the dropping grit got my proper attention and so I zipped outside with a torch and trained it on the chimney pots.

Sure enough, a minute or two later he emerged.

Some days later a couple of cement sheet discs were stuck over the chimney pots (after dark, 6-7 metres up a ladder, in high freezing wind - sho glad it wasn't me ).

I had long suspected that once the back chimney was sealed off then the front one would be on.

To be continued......

[FenceFurniture]

Sure enough, yesterday morning I awoke to utter chaos in the kitchen. Bins tipped over, scats and pee everywhere, partially eaten kiwi fruit, avocados, bread (kiwi was the favourite ). Things from on top of the benches strewn all over, vac pack machine sprung opened with pee and fur inside, more pee on my lovely Danish Oil finished table.

I was completely bewildered, as you might imagine. I did hear one noise during the night (I think around midnight) but I just put it down to one of our lively cats fooling around (they are always kept inside overnight).

It most certainly did not occur to me that there might be a possum cruising around!

After my usual early morning stupor passed I got to thinking how the little sod might get in, and it can ONLY be through the front room chimney. Inspection has revealed this to be the case.

The coke burning fireplace has a lid that can be swung open. It had been left open, and thus he gained his entry. Armed with mirror and torch I discovered that the chimney actually kicks off to the right after tapering off, about 1.5 metres from the floor. The construction is such that there is a nice flat ledge on the right for him to kip down on.

The first giveaway, as usual, was grit from the chimney wall accumulated on the floor. Inside the fireplace there is quite a deal more, and directly under the ledge is a large wet patch - obviously possum pee! Curiously, there are no scats there, so perhaps he's only taken up recent residence in there.

I leant the chimney lid forward to seal it off, but I had little doubt that he'd do his best to remove it - THAT, I would hear! It is right next to our bedroom. The door only weighs 1.9kgs, so if he is able to get a grip on it he may be able to move it. I'm sure he will at least give it a go.

To be continued.....

[FenceFurniture]

So, yesterday I used a coat hanger to wire the fireplace door closed. I expected to hear some scratching around trying to open it during the night.

We retired at 11.30, and you can imagine my surprise when at just after midnight I heard scratching around coming not from the front room, but directly behind the bedhead in the bathroom.

"This warrants some investigation" says I. Bugger me if he isn't sitting up on top of the shower rail staring back at me, with Nursie (my avatar) on the floor fascinated by what she saw!

Long story short, we locked the cats in the bedroom, shut off the front room and opened the front door. With a two foot stick I approached (with some trepidation I might add) so that I could give him a jab in the bum from inside the shower curtain, with Lola standing to the right of the bathroom door upon his exit. The idea being that if he exited right out of the bathroom he would see her and do a quick U-turn and scarper out the front door.

WRONG!

The jab in the bum worked splendidly and he launched off the rail, onto the table and then to the floor, miraculously without knocking anything off the somewhat cluttered table (ahem, not my clutter). He did indeed exit right but kept going straight past Lola into the scullery and out to the kitchen.

I hadn't opened the back door, and regretted it immediately.

I approached again and he made a bee line past me for the back of my desk, crawled up the back of the drawers and appeared to be stuck fast.

It's way too difficult to move the desk out easily with all the various wires etc, so I used the said two foot stick to inflict several slightly less than gentle and most unwelcome jabs into whatever soft bits I could sense.

About 30 seconds of this was required for him to give in, drop to the floor and scuttle through my legs at lightning speed. Given that I was squatting down under the desk I was rather relieved that he didn't try any funny business on his way through my legs (which widened considerably at his appearance). My head hitting the underside of the desk caused me no concern at all, under the circumstances.

This time he headed back towards the bathroom but kept going down towards the front door and ....just....kept going.

It took quite some time to get back to sleep!

[crowie]

You should have caught the thing Brett and posted it to New Zealand, I believe they love them ....

[NCArcher]

I'd attempt to catch a ringtail but I wouldn't mess with a brushie. You did well locking the cats away. Even a couple of cats would find a brushtail a hand full.
I have a pair of possum fur gloves I got from NZ. Very warm.
I just read this:
A number of New Zealand companies are exporting possum carcasses to Taiwan, Hong Kong and Malaysia for human consumption, where possum is regarded as a delicacy and known as "Kiwi bear".^[18] There is also a small industry processing possum meat as 'Possyum' dog food,^[19] also for export.
Yeah Crowie, they love their possums. Especially with a white wine sauce and a nice salad.

[FenceFurniture]

Heh heh. I was camping once about 20 or more years ago, and had a pair thick leather gloves on. Thought i'd try my luck with what appeared to be a reasonably friendly Brushie.

Ended up with a ball of TOTAL ANGER wrapped around my hand. Had to bowl him off (knew those ten pin skills would come in handy).

[Sawdust Maker]

effin possums

[crowie]

I'd attempt to catch a ringtail but I wouldn't mess with a brushie. You did well locking the cats away. Even a couple of cats would find a brushtail a hand full.
I have a pair of possum fur gloves I got from NZ. Very warm.
I just read this:
A number of New Zealand companies are exporting possum carcasses to Taiwan, Hong Kong and Malaysia for human consumption, where possum is regarded as a delicacy and known as "Kiwi bear".^[18] There is also a small industry processing possum meat as 'Possyum' dog food,^[19] also for export.
Yeah Crowie, they love their possums. Especially with a white wine sauce and a nice salad.

I'd only heard of Possum fur hats like our Akubra....

[Simplicity]

Brett you tell a good yarn.

[ajw]

I've got a family of possums living inside my garage roller door. They tumble around every time the door opens and closes, but refuse to leave. I'm up to the third generation living there. They run across the roof at night, sending the cat crazy.

Cheers,

ajw

[Uncle Al]

Great write up Brett. Fabulous mental images of you and Lola doing battle with your furry friend. Seems that the cats aren't overly interested in giving chase, maybe you need a Jack Russell or similar.
I'm sure plenty of forumites have a tale or two to share with their battles with these cute guys.

Alan...

[FenceFurniture]

Cheers Uncle.

Seems that the cats aren't overly interested in giving chase, maybe you need a Jack Russell or similar.

No, that was the problem - quite the opposite. They socialise with this possum to some extent. I've seen them just a metre apart out the back. No cat snarling or possum barking, the cats are fascinated by him, and he seems reasonably tolerant of them. Probably because they've never been aggressive towards him.

[malb]

The government apparently recently adopted my method for keepingthe poss's clear, and adapted it for boat people from Indonesia. It is fairly simple, pay them to turn around and go away.

We have had a family hanging around the neighbourhood for most of our 33 years in this house. A next door neighbour blamed 'my possums' for munching her roses 14 years ago, so we started to feed them regularly. No more complaints about the roses getting munched but we have never had possums actually living on our property.

We have never had trees that provide access to our roof etc, but have plenty of trees 10m away. and not overhanging. A large part of our colony live in a neighbours tree, and come down, across the roof of his detached garage and into our "possum tree". (We also have "magpie trees", "a butchy tree" and "kooky tree" where those critters get fed without interfering with each other or being hassled by the cats.) The rest of the colony come in from the street, along the fence or across the ground.

Feeding time is around an hour after dark in summer, or between 8 and 8.30pm April to October, and there is always half a cheap apple and a slice of cheap bread for every possum that fronts up. We generally have a good relationship with the poss's, around half respond to being called by name, and a similar number are happy to accept a pat on the head while munching.

I have had a gentle nip on the hand twice in ten years, once a couple of years ago when one of the girls had collected her bread and was munching in a fork in the tree and my hand brushed her belly as I was placing her half apple in the fork. Couldn't work out why at the time but a fortnight later she arrived one night with two 'riders' (my term for babies just out of the pouch and clinging to mum's back) on her, and realised that my hand must have touched or gotten close enough to her pouch and alarmed her causing her to become defensive. She was more than happy for me to hand feed the youngsters while she munched her own goodies from the first night she bought the riders in. Both youngsters are now great granny's but still like their pat and feed each night and make sure to introduce their riders asap, as have all their generations of descendants.

Another poss nipped me about a week ago, she took station in a fork where I had left the half apple, and I was returning to place the bread in the fork for her. She threw away the half apple she was munching, nipped me on the knuckle, then caught the slice of bread as I dropped it. Still getting along well with her so it was obviously just frustrated about getting the dessert (apple) before the main (bread).

Years ago Percy (poss) was well trained and would come to the family room door and tap if he had missed out on a feed because he had been seeing to secret poss business (breeding). He would come in, grab a couple of cat biscuits and trot around to the pantry to wait for us to get his goodies. Also sat down on the floor a few times to watch tele for a few minutes then took his dinner back to the tree as soon as an ad came on.

Our cats have been trained from day one not to hassle birds or possums within sight of the house, and the local wildlife know that our place is a safe zone for them and that we are suckers for wildlife. We often have magpies, butcherbirds, or possums walk past a cat on the doormat, through the door to bot a few cat bics, then stroll back out past the cat without any issues.

I gave the missus a look at this thread and she thought it was hilarious and almost wet herself laughing.

[rustynail]

We too had one living in the roller door. Each morning I would open the door to go to work, the possum would hang a hand out the end for a piece of the apple I habitually munched as I left the house. I'd bite off a chunk and dutifully pass it up. A peace offering.

[FenceFurniture]

On re-reading my third post it revealed that there is something that is perhaps not clear.

The fact that Possum was sitting up on the shower rail - with the fireplace closed off hours before sunset - means that he had kipped the whole day Wednesday inside the house somewhere.

Now if i was just here by myself I could understand how he would sleep in peace, but it was a wet day, and the cats (3) all spent the majority of the day inside.

How come they didn't discover him (by smell if nothing else) and therefore sit staring at him which would of course alert me? Bloody weird that.