The Awesome Opossum
Underrated, underestimated yet lifesaving
Upon the field under Texas stars so bright,
An opossum trotted in, a whimsical sight.
As fans and players watched with delight,
Its jaunt across the green sparked the night's highlight.
—-Anonymous
The word opossum is an Algonquin1 word, “apasum”, which means “white mammal”. It was adopted as the English word for the mammal in 1612, when Captain John Smith of the Jamestown Colony wrote to his sponsors back in England that, “An opossum has a head like a swine, and a tail like a rat and the Bignes [size] of a cat. . .”2
An opossum was the highlight of the TTU v. TCU game this week for many (other than for TTU fans, winning the game). This assuming opossum made a surprise entry onto the Lubbock, Texas football field in front of at least a million fans,3 and tried desperately to evade capture. When the lasso finally secured the opossum, it let us know it was displeased with its toothy hiss while being tugged off the field.
The most priceless moment had to be when TTU President Lawrence Schovanec gave the sidelined, yet unshakeable little star, a reassuring petting.
Photo credit: “X” Jonathan Botros, Deputy Athletic Director @TechAthletics @jbotros
The Opossum in Culture
The “opossum” may become a lucky totem for TTU, because TTU went on to win 35-22 after the opossum entered the field about the moment when the teams were tied. (I have heard this may not be the first time an opossum has run onto a football field for TTU.)
But the “opossum” in human tradition and culture goes back to before written history. A story told in the oral tradition by the Cherokee people explains why the opossum has a bare tail. The opossum was far too proud of its beautiful furry tail so the trickster rabbit arranged to have the opossum’s hair shaved off by the cricket, teaching a lesson of humility.4 The Caddo people have a story where the opossum tricks the coyote the trickster animal for the Caddo Nation, by playing dead after coyote thinks he has left him for dead.5 The Lenni Lenape Tribe tells a story of animals trying to put the sun back in place. The opossum wraps its tail around the sun to carry it back, but the sun burns off all of its hair so it has a bare tail to this day.6 A lesson to respect those who go to try to do good works for their Tribe, but return with permanent changes to their appearance, even if they fail. Some Tribes had clans named after the opossum, like the Yuchi Tribe, Opossum Clan.7
“Playing ‘possum” is an old idiom meaning to fake being asleep, which an opossum will do to discourage any would-be attacker. However, this is an involuntary response to surprise and it can last for up to four hours.8 This was captured in pop culture in the 2006 DreamWorks film “Over the Hedge,” where father-daughter opossums play dead whenever danger appears.9
“Opossum-like peradectids first appeared on the continent about 65 million years ago, at the time of the Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event, which killed the dinosaurs,” according to recent discoveries of opossum skulls.10 That is an incredibly early mammal and putting it into perspective spiders appeared around 350 million years ago. The modern day Virginia Opossum in North American has been around for 100,000 years, which is also impressive.11
But no one really wants to encounter one because they can be rightly defensive and they have a lot of tiny sharp teeth. They will hiss and appear aggressive, although it is just a fierce show, if you confront them. They are known to carry leptospirosis, tuberculosis, coccidiosis, spotted fever and tularemia. But they rarely carry rabies.12 Some would love to see them eradicated as a pest that invades garbage cans. Sadly opossums endure animal cruelty at a greater rate than many other animals. But opossums are a lesson of the rule of the tinkerer, as well as the environmental principle --- never throw away any of the pieces.
It turns out they may hold the cure for snakebite, with no side effects.
In 2015, at the annual meeting of the American Chemical Society, researchers from San Jose University announced they had isolated the peptide that could neutralize or block the harmful protein in rattlesnake venom and other poisonous snakes.13 They isolated this peptide from the opossum which has an immunity to snake venom.
It is also important to note that every ecosystem must have a way to hold populations in balance. Snakes with venom and its uncanny striking capability are formidable opponents. You need a predator that is fast enough to catch them, and immune to its venom – the opossum.
Next door to Lubbock in West Texas terms is Sweetwater, Texas, home of the rattlesnake roundup. This is the single biggest rattlesnake event in the world and has been a tradition in the second weekend of March.14 A project of the Sweetwater Jaycees, it has been going since 1958.15 It is intended to control the population of rattlesnakes where, despite the presence of opossums, the rattlesnakes still rule. This may explain the excess opossums in West Texas where they are spilling over into the football field.
The truth is that development is destroying opossum habitat and they are becoming urban wildlife, adapting to garbage cans and life in the city after dark. They are arboreal and nocturnal and can live comfortably in an urban setting.
Awesome Opossum Facts
Photo credit: Bill Peterson, USFWS
Opossums are the only marsupials in North America. They are pregnant only 12 days before giving birth to “joeys” that crawl to the pouch where they live for the next 4.5- 5 months. Opossums are different from possums, although the shorthand for the name is often used. Opossums live in the western hemisphere while possums live in the Australia region.
The plural for opossum is either opossum or opossums.16
Risk of death mainly from automobiles
Unfortunately, opossums are threatened by the loss of habitat but more from deaths from automobiles at night. Because they are nocturnal and feed at night, they often spot roadkill in the road and go to investigate it. Because they are such slow moving mammals, they cannot get out of the way of oncoming cars fast enough to avoid often fatal encounters. So it is not surprising that most orphaned opossums are due to their mother being hit by a car.17
Opossums come in many species, but they are not endangered or even threatened. So their protection depends on state laws that prohibit capturing and keeping wildlife as well as laws against animal cruelty.
Opossum Law
If you want an opossum as a pet, you can only do that in a few states. In other states, you can obtain a permit for rehabilitating a possum but that requires you to send it back to the wild when it has been rehabilitated. Most states make it a illegal to keep wildlife (exotics) and opossums are sometimes classified as wildlife.
North Carolina has a truly ridiculous law that sounds like it was written in the 17th Century but it was written in the 21st Century — and is still law. You can bet there is a long story behind a law that suspends all wildlife laws for five days each year between Dec. 29 and Jan. 2 as it applies to the opossum, only. The statute invites cruelty to opossums on its face. PETA has repeatedly challenged the legality of this18 and similar legal mechanisms made specifically to protect one gas station owner in Clay County, N.C. who wants to put an opossum in a plexiglass cage and drop it from the ceiling for New Year’s Eve.19 Here is the 2015 statute:
Wildlife and pets are regulated by state and local governments, except when sold in interstate commerce. There are thirteen states that specifically name one or more species of opossum as the target of regulation:20
States that specifically prohibit opossums:
Arizona (American opossum is illegal; short tailed opossum is legal)
Colorado
Maine (short tailed opossum is illegal)
Minnesota
New Hampshire
Rhode Island
States that require a permit:
Indiana (requires a Class II permit which is the middle level of safety.)
Missouri
Nebraska (a captive wildlife permit is required)
Oregon (up to three with a wildlife holding permit)
North Dakota (license required)
States that require no permit for an opossum (note species):
Oregon (short tailed opossums are not considered to be wild and no permit)
Arkansas (up to six opossums without a permit)
Wisconsin (considered a wild animal pet but no permit required)
Wyoming (only requires opossum to be “securely confined”)
The opossum remains an emblem of survival and ingenuity, its story woven through the tapestry of Native American folklore as a creature of cunning, and stands defiant even as it is told it must leave the TTU football field. Misunderstood and often maligned, this humble marsupial has ambled across a football field for an audience of millions, yet prefers its nocturnal escapades to visit the garbage cans. Named by the Algonquin and named for a Mohegan Clan, the opossum carries the secrets of an ancient mammalian lineage, its very name a testament to a rich cultural diffusion that predates many a modern misapprehension. As science pays homage to its resilience, we applaud its fine performances playing dead or “playing ‘possum”.
The opossum deserves our respect. Maybe think about slowing down when you drive in the night, and keep the opossum just “playing” dead.
This is the language group of Native American Tribes (Chowan, Powhatan alliance) who encountered the colonists of Jamestown. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carolina_Algonquian_language
https://www.wildliferesponse.org/component/k2/item/57-virginia-opossum
https://www.sportsmediawatch.com/2016/11/college-football-ratings-fox-fs1-texas-tcu-viewership/
https://www.northerncherokeenation.com/why-the-opossumrsquos-tail-is-bare.html
https://www.thc.texas.gov/public/upload/historic_sites/caddo_mounds/lessons/week_4/Coyote%20Hungry.pdf
https://www.nativeamericanembassy.net/www.lenni-lenape.com/www/html/LenapeArchives/LenapeSet-01/buzzard.html
https://www.google.com/books/edition/North_American_Indian_Anthropology, p. 181.
https://www.kpax.com/news/a-wilder-view/a-wilder-view-the-science-behind-playing-possum
https://outdoor.wildlifeillinois.org/articles/virginia-opossum/
https://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns/rabies/pdf/vs-0612-wildlife-rabies-h.pdf
https://preply.com/en/question/plural-of-opossum
https://www.wildlife-education.com/found-baby-opossums.php
https://www.peta.org/blog/wont-believe-far-people-will-go-abuse-opossums/
https://www.findlaw.com/injury/torts-and-personal-injuries/exotic-animal-laws-by-state.html
What a fun story!! I have newfound respect for opossums, since I recently witnessed one "play dead" in my backyard, and the deception was nothing short of amazing. Even more amazing is that the opossum does not control this catatonic state, which can last from minutes to hours. Opossums are fascinating, resourceful creatures that deserve our respect and protection, especially from idiot gas station owners in North Carolina.