The other evening as the sun was setting, our fluffy white dog, Princess, let out a high-pitched bark that sounded like a frightened call.  When I found her, I was startled too.

In the dim light of twilight, I saw something that looked like a big grey rat perched on the wood fence.  On closer inspection, it was even uglier than I thought with its strange pointy nose and vicious teeth coming out of its mouth.  The claws were sharp and dug into the fence.  Its grey fur was full rather than slick against the body.  The tail was almost as long as the body, thin, round, and grey with no fur on it.  I thought it was probably an opossum but I would check on that later.  First, I had to get rid of the beast.

The broom on the porch would be perfect for the job.  I held the long handle of the broom and used the business end to poke the opossum.  It didn’t move or budge or jiggle.  The opossum appeared to be glued to the fence.  Next, since opossums are nocturnal animals and only come out in the dark, the flashlight seemed like a good idea.  But shinning the light in the creature’s beady black eyes did nothing.  My last thought that evening was of water.  I got out the hose, which was too short, and tried to spray the opossum.  The only thing that got wet was me and it was a cool spring evening so I end up cold and wet.  With our defeat, Princess and I retreated to the comfort of the recliner and dog bed.

The next evening was even stranger.  Princess was in the backyard making a lot of noise.  I rushed out to see what was happening.  There was Princess facing off with the opossum.  The creature made a mistake using the cement block fence and wasn’t able to grip the blocks with its sharp claws.  The opossum has a dangerous trick that Princess didn’t know about.  When attacked by an enemy, instead of fighting back the tricky opossum plays dead.  The saying “playing possum” comes from this habit.  Once the unsuspecting dog is over the opossum, it uses its sharp claws and fifty teeth to try to hurt the dog’s underside and sometimes causes death.  Knowing this about the opossum, I got the little dog away from the fight but not before Princess got a piece of the opossum.  It was really just a tuft of fur but I called her the mighty hunter anyway.

After the neighbors dug the bushes out of their side yard, we didn’t see the opossum again.  Opossums like to live in a hollow of a tree or under stumps or roots not on open ground.  We were actually lucky in our adventure with the opossum because it was only rat sized.  When fully grown the opossum is the size of a house cat.

                                                                             Copyright J. Roswell

Postscript

The opossum is now full grown and the size of medium house cat.  Princess was outside barking once again and I had the misfortune to go to see what was the matter.  There was the creature on the wood fence once again but more fierce than last summer.  It was early morning and trash day which probably brought the opossum out in the daylight.  This time I tried to persuade it to leave with a loose slat from the fence.  I poked and poked but the opossum had a firm grip on the fence.  It spit at me like a cat.  Princess and I gave up and went back inside.  We watched from the window till the opossum finally left the fence for the neighbor's yard.