Opossums

[deere755]

About 3 weeks ago I came home to find the garage door open and inside was a opossum eating out of a sack of dog food. I tried to run him out but he would always run into a corner so I picked up an old wooden ball bat and loved on him a few times and carried him out to the field. A couple nights later same thing. I told my son he would have to make sure he put the door down when he was done in there. About a week later my wife comes in the walk in door to get something out of the freezer and turns to see a opossum following her in the door. So I loved on him with the bat and threw him in the field next to the other two. I am not sure why all the sudden they are a problem but the bat works well on them.

 

[Soundguy]

They go where the food is.

soundguy

 

[bjcsc]

Bird: More than likely, people identified your jackrabbits as pests and carriers of disease and either shot them all or beat them with bats whenever they saw them. Funny when folks move to the country and then commence to killing all the creatures that live there...

 

[4720 OWNER]

Bird: More than likely, people identified your jackrabbits as pests and carriers of disease and either shot them all or beat them with bats whenever they saw them. Funny when folks move to the country and then commence to killing all the creatures that live there...

Best are deer, they are cute until they get run over by the land rover and then they are a terrible critter to have around and should only be on the nature channel or locked up in zoos. They seem to be even more incensed when the deer eat their pretty ornamental plants.

 

[Kendrick]

you would love the leavenworth times article about 3? years agao. the most promonant vet shot a doe with faun in city for eating his bigonias. the morons at police let the wild life dpt handle the case and he didnt get jack for a sentance.

 

[JB4310]

Well that's 2 for and about 20 against, poor possum, now I know why we have so much wild life in the suburbs, bats, guns, burn barrels, lead poisoning, feedin em to illegals LOL!!!, My old Shepperd would catch em in the yard once in a while and they were the dirtiest, stinkinest critters, I'd call the animal control officer (formally known as the guy called dog catcher) and let him take care of them.

One day I was hauling a lot of brush out of my yard and this little possum came running out under the tractor, I must of loaded the rest of the family on the dump trailer as I never saw any others that day, anyway the thing was so little I felt sorry for it and put him in a box, we took care of it for about 8-10 weeks, the kids loved it and did handle it often but I made sure they washed there hands after every exposure. He ate different things but was pretty finicky, it surprised me how clean and soft this thing was, not like the older ones, also it was very gentle never tried to bite, but he would bluff with that menacing mouth open look, wouldn't make a good pet though, had zero personality. We let him get bigger and let him go at a local vegetation land fill, figured he'd have a chance of surviving there.

This is how big he was when we let him go.

 

[JC-jetro]

Hey John,,

Possums are sure nasty , smelly critters. I don't particularly have anything against them till they started dropping their stinkies on our lawn. It seemed they made my backyard their social dumping ground... but they didn't know me real well, did they!!

So I went to the drawing board and made the contraption pictured with a drop gate. I dangled a pieced of salmon skin inside after I deboned the fish inside, they would go in , pull the skin with String attached causing a pin to pull and the gate to drop with critter inside . I caught many possums (catch and release), few coons and couple of cats and we live in the burbs for crying outloud. Me, the boys and their buddies used to load up the critters and dumped them in a nature trails near by.

JC,

 

[Soundguy]

Nice trap ya mad ethere!

soundguy

 

[JC-jetro]

Nice trap ya mad ethere!

soundguy

Thanks Chris,

Actually that was my second trap. The first one I made was a bit smaller and not as long. That ole possum could not pass "salmon skin" but did not want to go inside either , so he reaches inside with his right arm, grabs a hold of the skin and tries to pull it out, the gate drops and he gets his arm stuck but he ain't about to let go till I get there.. I ended up wacking him in the head with a branch before he decided to get out of Dodge without the salmon. After My initial R& D (research and development) and failure I made it a bit bigger and longer contraption and had a salmon piece dangle all the way the other end. I ended up catching that same possum next night In the morning my wife told me you better get rid of that thing in the back yard.. I told her "I'll do it after work".. she called me about 9:30 am and said "you've done it now, the poor thing is dead frothing out of his mouth belly up in the cage". I told her "all is well".. that thing is playing possum and she said "What?" .Asked her to get the water hose and spray the critter and the possum perked right up

 

[Soundguy]

Got to watch out about the frothy mouth ones though!

soundguy