Hi, I'm ranger Kaitlin, and welcome to Shenandoah National Park.
How many of you have ever seen a opossum? I've seen them in my yard at home;
I've seen them along roadsides; I've seen them in the park here at Shenandoah. But,
I don't really know what this animal does. What is its job? What is its purpose? Other
than making some of us maybe a little a little uncomfortable by their very smile toothy smiles,
there are a lot of myths out there about what opossums are and what they do.
So before we go through what we already know about opossums, write in the comments what you
think you know about opossums already. Or, do you have a question about opossums? But,
something that you've always wondered about them, if you've ever wondered about opossums before,
give these following statements a thumbs up or thumbs down on whether or not you think
they're true. So, opossums are menacing and will attack humans. Thumbs up? Thumbs down?
Thumbs down. Opossums are are more of a prey animal, so if they come into what they think
is a predator they may hiss to try to scare you away, but what they're gonna do is they're either
going to remove themselves from the situation, like I do, they're going to run away, or they
may faint as well, or play opossum. Next one: Opossums carry rabies. Thumbs up? Thumbs down?
Thumbs down. Opossums are very unlikely to carry rabies.
Wild dogs that you may encounter are eight times more likely to have rabies than opossums are.
Next one: Opossums have more teeth than humans do. Thumbs up or thumbs down?
Thumbs up. Opossums do have more teeth than humans. They have about 50 little teeth
all throughout their jaw lines, sharp little teeth too.
They have one of the smile-- the "teethiest" smiles in North America.
The next statement: Opossums sleep hanging upside down by their tail.
Thumbs up? Thumbs down?
I'm sorry, Disney has led you astray. Opossums do not sleep
by hanging by their tails at night. They're actually den creatures. They will find or make,
but usually they find, a den already established under trees or in the rocks,
and that's where they'll spend their time sleeping and hiding away. They do have that
prehensile tail then they can use it to carry things like scientists and people have seen
opossums carry like sticks or grass to their bedside to their den site to make their beds
a little better--a little softer, but not necessarily hanging from a tree to sleep.
And the last fact: Opossums are unusual. Thumbs up? Thumbs down?
Well, I guess that one's kind of more of a personal opinion about whether you think opossums
are unusual or not. Even with their peculiar looks, opossums, with a great sense of smell
and touch, have been--have lived here for millions of years. In 1608, Captain John Smith wrote in his
notes: "An opossum has a head like a swine and a tail like a rat and is the bigness of a cat.
Under her belly she has a bag where she lodges, carryeth, and suckleth her young." Captain John
Smith took the word "opossum." It's actually an indigenous word just meaning "white animal."
It can have the "o" in front of it or not. It's kind of colloquial depending on where you're from.
For over 400 years, scientists have been studying and looking at the opossum, but they believe
they've actually been around for millions of years. Individually their adaptions on this animal
doesn't seem too, too grand, but when all added together it makes for a compact little creature.
Look at my little finger puppet here, or the opossum skull that I have in my hand here,
you can see that they have a very pointed snout. Their sense of smell is very strong.
They can do better at finding food in a maze and remembering where food is at better than cats,
rats, mice, and rabbits. They have a great sense of smell. Their ears, when seen in a photo,
are often bare skin just like their tail as well. When you look at a map of where opossums live,
you'll see and notice that they don't tend to live in the very cold areas because of that bare skin
on the tail and ears. If you do see an opossum with ear pieces missing, or a tail piece missing,
or maybe even some toes, it's because of frostbite. They do not grow a winter pelt or
grow additional fur either, so what they have is what they keep with them, and surprisingly
it's very soft. Now there is some underfur that you you can see when you open up the the fur to
get closer to it, so it is kind of similar to some dogs however they do not grow anymore.
So during the colder months, it's very hard for them to stay warm.
Opossums can be anywhere between 20 to 24 inches in length.
That's including from their tip of their nose all the way down to their scaly tail that they have.
They can be anywhere between four to twelve pounds, so about the same size of a house cat
that you may have as a pet at home. The opossum is North America's only marsupial.
Meaning that they're young or live in the mother's pouch.
Now baby opossums are actually born outside of the pouch, and they're born so small that you can fit
a large amount of them, like 20 of them, in one tablespoon. That's how tiny they
are when they're born. They have, they have a very short gestation period - only 12 to
13 days - and after they're born outside of the opossum, the babies crawl up the mom's tummy,
and enter into the pouch. That's where they attach to a nipple, and they'll be there for about three
to four months until they're big enough to climb out on top of mom, and you often will see photos
of baby opossums being carried around on mom, and they'll hang out with mom anywhere between six
to eight months, and then they're typically old enough to survive on their own after that point.
This guy's still a little young. We're gonna go ahead and keep him safe in the pouch for now.
When we look at all the individual adaptations of the opossum,
it kind of creates this very compact little creature. They only live to be
two to four years old in the wild, however they've been surviving for millions of years.
They can be a benefit in your backyard. They're a part of the ecosystem,
however, they also can be a nuisance. Their nose being so strong leads them to where food is,
so if you happen to live in bear country you already should be doing this,
but to keep opossums out of your yard and out of your garbage or trash, make sure they're in tight,
airtight containers or bear proof containers, like if you're living around here at Shenandoah
National Park. If you have any dog food, chicken food, anything like that, store those in secure
containers and out of reach out of little opossum hands, and hopefully that will help deter them
from getting into those areas. Opossums are opportunistic. They will eat just about anything
wherever they can. So they'll eat snakes, toads, fungus, cockroaches, rats carrying
dead stuff, insects-they eat just about anything. Opossums are nature's little sanitation workers,
so they can help keep your yard a little clean. They are also prey in the ecosystem. Bobcats,
foxes, coyotes, owls, birds of prey, they will all prey on opossums when they can,
so they are part of the ecosystem here at Shenandoah, and in your yard one of the things
some people may have heard is that opossums eat ticks-kind of another benefit to maybe having
them around as well. Now ticks aren't necessarily part of their diet. It's just kind of a byproduct
of something that they do. Opossums clean themselves as often as your house cat does.
They clean themselves quite often, and if they find a tick on them while they're cleaning, they
go ahead and eat it. In a study, it showed that 90 of the ticks that were on opossums were killed,
and that's just because they like to stay clean. Surprisingly, whenever I see an opossum they look
kind of scratchy and scrangly, like, they look dirty. I'll say that. They don't look like they'd
be soft and clean, but surprisingly their pelt is with--because of how often they clean themselves.
The Virginia or North American opossum does have a purpose in the ecosystem. They do have a job
as little sanitation workers as well as prey for other animals throughout the park. Here at
Shenandoah National Park, the opossum has the opportunity and a place to thrive as predator
and prey in the ecosystem. They're doing their job. They can be a nuisance in your backyard
if they're not taken care of properly, well if things aren't taken care of properly.
Many states do consider them to be a nuisance, but here at Shenandoah
they're just part of the park. They're part of what's here
so Shenandoah National Park, and other national parks can't be here without visitors like you
visiting the parks and supporting them. So, thank you for doing your part in the ecosystem too!
Share this video if you think you've learned something new about opossums,
and please check out our website to learn more about Shenandoah National Park.
You know, because of this program, I've been following a lot of opossum Facebook pages.