Kidzone Super Heroes Opossums

Opossum Superpowers

While opossums are often stung by bees and scorpions, they have an impressive ability to tolerate those poisons. Opossums are immune to snake venom.

While they’re both marsupials, opossums live in North and South America. The most common is the Virginia Opossum. Possums, on the other hand, live in Australia and other countries.
While many wonder whether opossums can get rabies, their body temperature is too low for the virus to survive like it does in other mammals, such as raccoons and bats.
While opossums are often stung by bees and scorpions, they have an impressive ability to tolerate those poisons.
They are resistant to most forms of snake venom, including venom from rattlesnakes and copperheads.
Opossums originated in South America and spread to North America when the continents conjoined. While a total of 103 species have been recorded throughout the Americas, these species are not found in any other region on Earth.
Opossums have 50 teeth!

One of the most commonly known habits of opossums is “playing dead” or, as it is frequently called, “playing possum.” …if it is surprised by a predator, it will enter a catatonic state. It basically faints and is in a state of unconsciousness. The opossum has no control over this; it’s involuntary.It does indeed appear if the opossum is dead. Its teeth are visible, as if in a death grimace. It emits a foul substance from its anus, the smell described as corpse-like.
Baby Virginia opossums are born hairless and sightless and are about the size of a honeybee.
Opossums will eat just about anything. Earthworms and insects found in yards, garden plants and garbage create an opossum smorgasbord.
Their tails (and ears) are hairless, making them particularly susceptible to frostbite and even hypothermia.
Opossums will den for a few days to escape the cold, but they don’t hibernate. They have to feed periodically. Sometimes they’ll change their nocturnal habits and feed in daylight hours during the winter, to take advantage of warmer temperatures.
Just like humans and other primates, the possum has the equivalent of opposable thumbs.
Opossums have prehensile tails that they use like a hand or a fifth appendage. Their tails allow them to grasp, carry, and wrap around things like tree limbs. Opossums can hang from their tails, but only for brief periods.
Sanitation workers of the wild, opossums have an unusually high need for calcium, which incites possums to eat the skeletons of rodents and roadkill they consume.

As city wildlife goes, opossums make good neighbors. They rarely contract rabies. They won’t eat your pets. They will gobble up garbage, including bones and other refuse raccoons won’t touch.
These harmless creatures pose absolutely no threat to people, and they are far more beneficial as scavengers than harmful for any damage they might do.

The good news is, if you can keep them out of the places where you don’t want them, opossums are actually pretty amazing creatures to have on the homestead.
By their very nature, opossums are neither aggressive nor destructive, and do not pose a threat to humans.

Their ability to survive in various environments showcases their resilience and resourcefulness.
They invest more energy in their babies than any other carnivore.
Hyena cubs are some of the cutest and most playful mammals in the entire animal kingdom.

When it comes to family support, all mothers within a clan collectively nurse and protect the cubs. All members will cooperatively bring food from a hunt or scavenge to share with the little ones.

Opossum Superpowers

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