Saturday, April 23, 2011

Hello Possums!

In a previous post I'd talked about visiting Edenvale and trying to see a family of possums who lived there, to no avail, but last Sunday I was once again at Edenvale having a look at an arts and crafts festival and decided to enquire if the possums were still around.
The young girl from the cafe went outside to have a look and spotted a tail.  She went back into the cafe and came back out with half an apple - next minute who did we see peeping out of the trees but one of the possums.
He was gorgeous, so cute and appealing, despite the fact that most people consider them vermin.
He loved the apple and wasn't afraid of me snapping pictures of him.  I stood on a chair to get a closer look, much to the amusement of the patrons sitting around enjoying coffee and cake.
I soon had a little crowd of people around me wondering what on earth was so interesting to have a middle aged, seemingly insane woman, pointing her camera up a tree and squealing with delight.
Now just look at that face .... so cute, pity his claws weren't so appealing.  They were like something out of a werewolf movie.
No sign of the rest of his family who were in hiding, but he was enough.  I must've taken nearly a hundred photos of him including one which shows he's got a bad tooth.  Wonder if he'd fancy a dentist.
He then raced back up the tree and as I was trying to photograph him from underneath he decided to bombard me with pooh.  At first I didn't know what was going on, I just got hit with rapid gunfire of hard bullets bouncing off my feet, until everyone started laughing and I realised what was going on.
Then he peeped back out at me with a cheeky look on his face, and I couldn't be cross with him.
Someone else came along with half an orange then, so he was back down in a flash for another nibble whilst I went home for a bath and a change of clothes.  It was all worth it though, I still think they're loveable, until he gets into my roof, and then I'll be cursing him and calling him vermin.
It's only taken me 44 years living in this country to actually see a live possum.  Mission accomplished!

3 comments:

  1. My first husband was peed on by a squirel he was trying to shoo out of our walnut tree once. They're canny little ceatures really.

    Lovely story, thanks Julie.

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  2. A lovely story, it is really very cute. But I can imagine how awful they would be in the roof. My neighbours had squirrels in their roof, apart from the noise they caused a lot of damage.

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  3. I thought they only came out at night. Unfortunately here they actually are vermin! How fascinating to actually see one in daylight.

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