Possums eat ticks?

Marsupials? Well, in the White House, we have the duck-billed platitudinous.

Sorry. My bad. It's just a character defect.
 
maybe you missed the thread topic.
also, what other marsupials are native to north America?
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I didn't miss the thread topic. You stated
the only marsupial in the new world and you-ins want to destroy them.
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The Virginia Opossum (which is the topic of the thread) isn't the only marsupial in the New World. There are a lot of native opossum species in the New World which includes more than just North America, but Central America, South America, Bermuda and the Caribbean, though the various opossum species are mainland-only.
 
Its really hard to measure all the consequences of any particular species, but possums are probably one of the less damaging to human interests. I can find many examples of both "good" and "bad" in the diet of any wild animal. Possums are omnivores eat whatever they can scavenge. Their predation is limited to pink and hairless baby rodents in the nest, and slow moving insects, larvae, grubs, slugs. They seem to have a huge appetite for other dead animals. That's what I used for bait when I used to trap them. We have a season on them in Ohio, and they are not an open season varmint here.
 
If you look at possums, they're slow and stupid.

They have to compete with raccoons, which are agile and clever.

The only way they can survive is to eat something that raccoons won't.

Now that's a sobering notion.
 
When I got my first gun, my mother, in a very somber tone, told me to "never kill anything you can't brag about."

I never figured there was much to brag about shooting a possum.
 
Ever seen a possum play possum?

On several occasions I've encounter possums on my buddie's long drive way. I've done my best to scare them good. High beams, loud aooogah horn, etc. Not once have I ever scene one play "possum." Traps one in a tree in my back yard and stung his butt good with a pellet gun (live in town so no firearms shooting, actually the pellet gun was not legal either) and he just kept hissing at me.

Has any one ever seen a possum play possum?

Live well, be safe
Prof Young
 
They may eat eggs. But they also eat rats and mice. Which are equally as prolific in eating eggs. So I'd call that a wash. They eat insects. Including ticks. They are the only marsupial on our continent and they have outlasted the dinosaurs. They are also immune to all venomous snakes except coral snakes and they eat snakes too. Kill them if you like killing, but you're not doing your local ecosystem any favors.
 
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Yeah, I've seen them "play possum". Usually when I'd poke one with a stick. My grandparents killed them as protection of the eggs in the chicken house. My grandmother sold eggs--as well as turkeys and butter. WW II era.
 
Ticks just need packaging and marketing as high protein organic raisins at Whole Foods. Let the 2 legged possums eat 'em.
 
Has any one ever seen a possum play possum?
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Yes. I once had two of them fighting in my garage at 3 am. (They got in via the cat door). One had taken a defensible position under a cabinet and the other was trying to get at him. When I opened the door and turned on the lights, the aggressor fled, but the other one like it where he was. I figured he'd be gone in the morning, but when I checked later he was still there. So I tried poking him with a broom handle, but he rolled up and played dead. I put on a heavy jacket and leather gloves and picked him up by the scruff of the neck. He still played dead.

So I opened the door into the kitchen and said "I caught him, honey, you get to clean him."

My wife was not amused. ;)
 
They don't forage for ticks, but as pointed out earlier here they're fastidious about grooming themselves. And they can pick up lots of ticks. So the theory is that they serve as a version of a robot vacuum cleaner for ticks on your property. Not a perfect solution, but maybe a reason to tolerate them if you live in Lyme territory.
 
Possums eat ticks

I don't know specifically about ticks but if they can get it into their mouths they will.
I regret relocating the two Opossums that regularly patrolled the porches and all around the house.
They ate all the roaches and scorpions and anything else the came across including the cat's food.
We would find lots, of little droppings just about every day.
I intended to set some more cat food out and see I can lure some more around here.
You want to wash feed bowls and water bowls every day, for your animals.
Opossum droppings, in hay mows and barns and horse stalls carry diseases for farm animals.
 
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