Do NOT go up those stairs!

Said by my roommate.

Why?

There's something on the stairs!

Sure enough, we have a visitor! Isn't he cute?



(Yes, we went around the back door and the picture is taken through the door.)

If he isn't gone in the morning I guess we call animal control?

Otherwise, he's cute. Hello mister opossum!

Originally Posted by Forensic

Said by my roommate.

Why?

There's something on the stairs!

Sure enough, we have a visitor! Isn't he cute?



(Yes, we went around the back door and the picture is taken through the door.)

If he isn't gone in the morning I guess we call animal control?

Otherwise, he's cute. Hello mister opossum!

Click to expand...

Dang! isn't he just the cutiepie?

If he doesn't leave, you probably can just borrow a humane trap from Animal Control and catch him that way then release him. (bait it with KFC- they LOVE the stuff!)

I love opossums.

Aww what a sweetie.

He sure looks like a big' un too...I wouldn't want to corner him!

PLEASE do NOT call animal control! They will murder this precious opossum! She will probably run away if you walk towards her. They generally want nothing to do with other animals or people. I see the sides are somewhat rounded. This is baby season, and it's possible that this is a mother with babies in her pouch who feels she has found a safe place to rest.

I am a licensed Wildlife Rehabilitator specializing in opossums. If she (or he) is still present and you feel the need to move her, please PM me and I will assist you personally.

He's gone this morning! I would only have called animal control if I thought he was rabid, but him roaming around at night is no big deal to me...

He's cute... He can stay.

Opossums are actually the least likely of all animals, including humans, to carry rabies. It takes 200 times the amount of rabies to infect an opossum that it takes to infect a raccoon, and thats by injecting it directly in their bloodstream, thus bypassing their natural immune defenses Bless you for letting this precious little one stay around!

So cute! We had a baby one in the yard once, but unfortunately the dog found it before we did.

When we added onto our house 12 years ago, they had to take part of the roof off for a couple of months. A mother and baby decided to move into the attic. I can not begin you tell you the mess they created for us.

As long as they aren't in my attic, they are okay.

Originally Posted by DawnofSierra

PLEASE do NOT call animal control! They will murder this precious opossum! She will probably run away if you walk towards her. They generally want nothing to do with other animals or people. I see the sides are somewhat rounded. This is baby season, and it's possible that this is a mother with babies in her pouch who feels she has found a safe place to rest.

I am a licensed Wildlife Rehabilitator specializing in opossums. If she (or he) is still present and you feel the need to move her, please PM me and I will assist you personally.

Click to expand...

That may be the case in your area, however that is not the case everywhere. Most Animal Control workers would never dream of "murdering" such a cute face- AC workers are not evil. I used to work for animal control in our area- and anytime we had an opossum, we always cought/trapped it and released it back into the wild. We never put them down.

What a wonderful relief, Nikki! Thank you for sharing that!

So glad that you can appreciate the goodness of opposums!!!
For most of my life, growing up in the Sierra, I only had 2nd & 3rd hand stories from SoCal folks who spread the rumors of how vicious and aggressive opposums are - they go after dogs, attack with fearsome teeth and fangs (and since many of those people telling me the tales were the same ones who showed no fear of the approaching the bears feeding at the restaurant dumpsters, for the unique photo ops, I figured that opposums must be REALLY mean, to scare people that aren't afraid of territorial bears ). It wasn't until my dad had one show up at the feeders for his ferals down in San Bernadino county that I realized that not only was it cute, it was NOT crawling with vermin and it was very, very shy and passive even though she had these really cute "opposumettes?" on her back - those babies showed no fear of me - they all just stared as if they'd never seen a human before - too cute!!!
P.S. The town of Mammoth Lakes now has only bear-proof dumpsters and the "town bears" are much fewer than when I waited tables 8 years ago.

Our animal control would also not euthanise an opossum. They'd refer people to wildlife rescue who would catch and release it.