Thursday 20 August 2009

Possum Central

Wall-to-wall marsupials here. (Apart from the white-tailed rats, fawn-footed melomys and bats.) I've spotted two more pademelons (a jumpy juvenile and a grey-coated adult male), but am not sure if they'll be around much. In case they do stay, I've already picked out their names: Junior and the Grey Ghost.

Not that I've named every mammal on the property. That would be silly.

The two possums that patrol the garden each evening have no names. They might have their own names, of course, but I haven't given them any. They're coppery brushtails (Trichosurus vulpecula johnstonii), a subspecies endemic to the Atherton Tablelands.

Like their lowland relatives, coppery brushtails are compulsively inquistive. Although the darker one (top pic) is happy to peer at me from a couple of metres away, the lighter one (lower pic) will often sit on the outside sill with his face and paws pressed up against the glass. As I type this, he is trying to scale the window frame. The sound of possum claws against metal is not pleasant. Yet another reason to keep the unscreened windows shut after dark.