Cuter than a Baby Raccoon

Another evening walk sans camera.  Will I never learn?

We were headed down the road, Toby and I, when I heard a rustling in the shrubs and trees to our left.  I figured it was a rabbit or woodchuck getting off the road (see them a lot).  But then I saw some branches bobbing up and down.  I stopped, looked, and there precariously balanced on a very thin branch, was a baby opossum!  It was eating some berries that were on the shrub in which it was perched. Further investigation yielded a second baby in the tree next to it.  This sibling was much better hidden.

A baby opossum really is cute as a button.  It's silver white fur contrasts with the black tips on its ears.  The ears and tail are whole - no frostbite yet.  And they don't look all ragged and rough from age (not that 'possums live all that long in the wild, but after a year or two they are a bit scruffy-looking).

All was well, everyone foraging in peace, until Toby also spotted them (probably wondering why I had stopped walking and what I was staring at in the woods).  As you can guess, he started to bark.  The second 'possum immediately dropped from its perch (whether because it was making a hasty departure or because it fainted, I don't know), while the first one just froze.  It kept its beady eyes on us and just sat there for several minutes.

I finally got the dog quieted down, and we watched for quite a while (I'm sure passing cars were wondering what the heck this person crouched on the side of the road staring into the woods was doing).  Finally the little fella decided a departure was in order.  It turned around and headed for the trunk of the shrub.  Toby and followed suit, standing up and continuing our walk.

Did I mention we also saw an indigo bunting and another dragonfly perched in perfect silhouette on an old mullein stalk?  Yep - I should start taking the camera back out on our walks.

But, just so this isn't a total photoless post, here's a shot of what I did this last weekend, when it was over 100 degrees:

No, that's not me - I'm the one behind the camera.  But I was there, in full SCA garb (sweat literally pouring down my body), trying my hand at archery once more.  It's been nearly 20 years since I was in the SCA, but work (of all things) has gotten me in touch with the local groups, and the fine folks at the Barony of Cynnabar (Ann Arbor) invited me to come play with them.  I'll be off again this Sunday for an archery event with them:  Smurf Shoot.

Another Roadkill

I left home with plenty of time to get to work this morning, but I was delayed en route by a napping marsupial.

I wasn't five minutes out when I drove past an opossum taking a permanent siesta in the road.  I kept going, but then thought "that 'possum was in pretty good shape."  My next thought was "I'd sure like it's skull for our collection at work."  So I hit the brakes, turned around, pulled over, found a plastic bag in the car, stuck the body in the bag, and headed back to work, arriving only a couple minutes late.

Of course, Carrie and I (that's her foot in this photo) had to do a photo shoot, because it's not too often that one gets to see an opossum this closely without it having some say in the matter.

As with many animals, I was fascinated by its feet.   Here's a close up of one of the back feet.  Note that there isn't much of a claw on the "thumb."

The front foot looks so much like a human hand.  Click on the photo to get a good look at the "fingerprints" on the palm pads - they are beautiful!  I wonder of those "fingerprints" function like the ridges on a gecko's foot: extra gripping power.

Rigor mortis hadn't set in yet, so we were able to manipulate the feet and mouth to position them for better images.  Lifting up the lips, we had a good view of the teeth.  Opossums have the greatest number of teeth of any North American mammal.  They are mostly conical in shape, too, enabling these animals to eat just about anything.  They are scavengers, so most things are on the menu.  If you look closely, you will see that this poor fellow bit his tongue when he was hit by the car that did him in.   Sadly, parts of the jaw were broken by the collision.  I don't know how good the skull will be until we get the whole animal skinned, but I'm thinking it may not be great.  Pity.

As is typical of these animals, our specimen here showed some definite frostbite damage on the end of his tail.  I love how scaly the tail is - reminds me of a pangolin.

The ears are also prone to frostbite.  This one's ears weren't too badly bitten, but the edges show some scaring.

I was very excited to see that we had a male here.  Why?  Because opossums have a bifurcated penis - it is forked at the tip!  Now there's something you just don't see every day.  This trait had naturalists flummoxed for generations.  Early on man believed that the reason for this unusual design was that the males fertilized the females through the nose (two tips to the penis, two nostrils to the nose), and (it gets even better) the female then sneezed her young into the pouch on her belly (remember, this is a marsupial).  

In truth, reproduction happens the same with with opossums as it does for most other mammals, with the exception that the young are "born" extremely premature.  When they are "born," the little pink things wiggle their way across the mother's belly and into her pouch, where each one attaches to a nipple.  Here they stay, firmly attached, until their development is complete.  It's a rather odd way to develop if one is a fetus, but it seems to work for marsupials, and aren't we lucky to have a specimen of these unusual mammals here in our own back yards!

As interesting as this up close encounter with the opossum was, I think I still prefer to see them in their natural, alive state.   So, let's end with ...

  

The End.

Robins and Weasels and 'Possums, oh My!

 Well, you'll have to take my word for it, but mere moments before this photo was taken, this crabapple tree, which is in front of our offices at work, was filled with robins, happily eating away at last year's shriveled fruits.  While we all know that many robins do not migrate (or perhaps only migrate a short distance), we still like to cling to the idea of robins as harbingers of spring.  I know I certainly do.

 And therefore, since I can't wow you with a crabapple full of robins, how about some mystery tracks we found out back during my Winter Wildlife Signs class today?

This is a series of small prints of an animal loping.  Loping, in the horse world, is essentially a canter.  But in tracking we call it a lope.  There's one foot print, then two in the middle (sometimes so close together that they look like one), and finally a fourth print.  This set of four is followed by a space, and then they repeat, ad nauseum or until the animal changes its mind and its gait.

Now, were I back in the Adirondacks, these are the animals that would immediately come to mind when I see this pattern:  fox, coyote, fisher.

We don't have fishers here, at least not in this part of Michigan, and these tracks are just way too small (and too close together) to have been made by a coyote or even a fox.

Snow had been falling most of the day, so any evidence of actual footprints was gone.  Even so, my mind kept trying to put five toes into the prints I could see.

Based on size (and the marginally possible toe prints), I was leaning toward this being one of the smaller members of the weasel family: either the mink or the large-tailed weasel. 

Now, large-tailed weasels are not large animals.  In fact, they don't even qualify in my book as medium-sized animals, but everything is relative.  Even if we were to think of them as medium-sized, their feet are still quite small.  These tracks really were just too big to belong to this weasel.  This is even taking into account the fact that they (the tracks) look bigger than they really are. (When measuring tracks, you want to measure the minimum outline, which is what would appear in the base of the track, made by the pads of the foot; you don't want to measure the length and width of the whole track, for that takes into account fur, melt, and even the poofing-out of snow as the foot falls, giving you a falsely large set of numbers.)

So, this left me contemplating a  mink.  The size of the footprints were about right, but the space between the groups of four tracks just seemed too small.  Maybe this animal was loping slowly, though.  The other thing that bothered me, when considering mink, was that the tracks were not all that close to water.  In fact, they were closer to the building than the stream.  However, although minks are quite often found in or near water, it is not unheard of for them to head out across the woods or even open spaces when hunting, or when traveling from one body of water to another.


Based on all these thoughts, I'm sticking with mink.

When the tracking class ended, several of the participants headed to the gift shop and exhibit space, and they were tickled to see our resident opossum at the feeders.  An hour and a half later, it was still there, so I got out my camera and went stalking.

It wasn't too happy when I came crunching along.  Was I a threat?  Was I going to try to eat it?

Ever so slowly, it decided to begin preparations for escape.   First, it lifted one paw...and held it there for a couple minutes.

 Then it crossed that foot in front of the other and stood ready for a "quick" get away...just in case.

It's a good thing, really, that I wasn't interested in catching this critter except with the camera, for "hasty retreat" didn't seem to be within its abilities.  Note also, the rounded pink tip on the tail - a casualty to frostbite.

The snow was good and packy, making some fine imprints of the 'possum's feet. 

 And off it trundled, past the birdseed bin and into the woods.  It'll be back, either tonight or tomorrow, to feast once more beneath the feeders.

All in all, a pretty good day. 

This may be the last tracking chance for a while, for rain and even thunderstorms (and flooding) are in the forecast starting sometime late tomorrow.  Ah...the joys of living in southern Michigan!

Not All at the Feeders are Feathered

Last week my new friends at work decided to put a set of bird feeders up outside "my" window, which faces a small man-made pond. It didn't take long for the birds to find the feast, but they aren't the only ones.

The fox squirrels put on a good show yesterday. Carrie had hung some peanut butter and seed coated pine cones in the tree, and they are irresistible to squirrels.

Round and round we go.

Until the competition shows up. The original squirrel decided jumping from the branch was the greater part of valor,

leaving the spoils to the challenger, who bit the cone loose and ran off with it sticking out of his mouth like a giant cigar.


This afternoon, however, as Carrie and I were sorting through some old exhibit files, I looked up and saw something even more exciting. "There's a 'possum at the feeders," said I.

We both ran for our cameras, for opossums are not really diurnal animals. They prefer the extra cover a little darkness provides. But not this one, apparently. Not only was it not night, it wasn't even overcast! I guess some tasty sunflower seeds are good at any time of day. Just look at those stuffed cheeks:

Even the most devout disliker of opossums has got to admit that there are times they are just plain cute.

I have a little past history with opossums. My first experience was with a couple rehabbed baby 'possums. The rehabber had brought them to the property to return them to the wild and I tagged along. They were small, but full of teeth in those mouths that open abnormally wide. Opossums have the greatest number of teeth of any mammal, so it is very impressive when they open wide to scare off predators. Marylou tried to get them to cling to a tree, so they'd be safe after we left, but they insisted on being uncooperative. So, we left them on the ground, "playing dead."

Opossums don't really "play dead." It turns out that they actually faint - a physiological response to stress. Of course, it doesn't always work to the animals' advantage - note the number of 'possums permanently sleeping on roads.

Later in my career, I got some good hands on experience with a large opossum that was part of the education collection at the zoo where I worked. She mostly just wanted to sleep, so she was very docile.

Back to our friend at the bird feeders, who was totally focused on food. That is until Carrie tried to sneak up on it for a better shot. She went out the side door and peeked around the corner of the building. The little 'possum stopped munching and froze. It's little nose lifted, sniffing the air in her general direction.

Finally her presence became just too much, and the 'possum beat a slow retreat.

It obviously did not want to go wading back through that cold snow. Opossums are simply not designed for cold weather. Their naked feet, tails and ears can take a real beating in the winter, freezing, turning black, and falling off. Frostbite is a serious reality for these funny-looking marsupials.

Once in the snow, however, the 'possum picked up speed and disappeared under the pond's little deck.

Since both of us are avid trackers, Carrie and I went out to get a good look at the footprints left behind. Opossums have funny feet, with "thumbs" sticking out the side, distinguishing them from any other track in the woods (or fields).

There were enough tracks out there to suggest this was not the first trip this 'possum has made to the feeders. We expect to see it out there again.