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Virginia Opossum — Part 2
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In cold weather opossums retire to their dens and only occasionally venture abroad when there is snow on the ground. They are members of an almost tropical race that hates the cold, and wherever winter is an actual fact they are rarely found.
"Opossums are very prolific, having two or three litters each year, each litter composed of from six to thirteen, in rare instances as many as fourteen or fifteen. The young remain with their mother about two months, and at times a brood of sucklings may be found in the pouch, while a second brood the size of rats may be seen on her back, clinging to her fur with their hands and steadying themselves by winding their tails around her tail and legs.
"The opossum somewhat resembles a little pig in his flexible snout, small black eyes, and erect ears; but he resembles the pig much more in his fondness for eating and the great variety of food that suits his taste.
"His principal diet consists of insects, wild fruits, nuts and berries, varied with roots, reptiles, crayfish, carrion, eggs, small rats and mice, with additions of poultry, corn, sweet potatoes, and other farmyard delicacies." "He is the natural enemy of the cotton rat, a destructive rodent living in vast numbers in the seaboard marshes of the Southern States. If all the food eaten by a possum during the year were divided into two piles according to its economic status in relation to the interests of mankind, there can be little doubt that the pile containing the matter, animate and inanimate, whose destruction is an advantage to us would be notably the larger."
The Negroes of the Southern States feel that the possum was especially created for their benefit and delight. They say, perhaps with truth, that no white man can ever fully appreciate the delicious joy of a moonlight possum hunt, or the delicate flavour of roasted possum. There are plenty of white people who do enjoy hunting possums by the light of the moon, and eating their game the next day; but the varying degrees of happiness are not to be measured, and the exquisite enjoyment that the possum yields the darkey may only be guessed at. There is considerable similarity between a possum hunt and a coon hunt, so far as method is concerned. The Negroes like best to go in parties with two or three cur dogs along. Besides these there must be an axe, at least one antiquated fowling-piece and a sack for carrying the game. When the dogs start off on a hot trail, the darkies follow as best they may, stumbling along over rocks and stumps among the shadows. The possum frightened by the racket behind him soon takes to a tree for safety and flattens himself down on a branch or snuggles up in a crutch, trusting to remain unobserved.
But the Negroes flourishing their pitch-pine torches endeavour to locate their game by the glitter of its eyes in the flickering light, and if the tree is too big to cut down and difficult to climb, the rusty old firearm is brought into play. But as a general thing they much prefer capturing their possum alive if possible, either knocking him from his perch with a pole or chopping down the tree.
As soon as he strikes the ground, dogs and niggers fall upon him in one struggling, yelling heap, the dogs eager to kill the possum and their masters to get it away from them uninjured, and it is most astonishing how much rough handling an opossum can put up with without serious injury.
Sometimes he is carried home swinging by his tail from the end of a stick which has been split and snapped onto that member in such a manner as to hold him perfectly helpless.
The darkies' idea in taking him home alive, is to fatten for a few weeks in captivity, joyfully overlooking the mere question of economy in the matter; for the quantity of bread, yams and apples consumed by the greedy little beast in laying up a few additional ounces of fat is a thing to be marveled at.
Varieties of the Opossum
The opossums of North America show but little variation, but naturalists have recognized three varieties as follows, the last being allied to the opossum of Mexico.
1. Virginia Opossum. Didelphis virginiana Kerr. Range and description as above.
2. Florida Opossum. Didelphis virginiana pigra Bangs. Similar but smaller with longer and more slender tail.
3. Texas Opossum. Didelphis marsupialis texensis Allen. Similar but tail longer than in either of the above, equal to nine-tenths instead of three-fifths the length of head and body and black at base for one-third of its length.