They are not exactly the prettiest animal in the world, which may be why Rob Ford is afraid of them. They can be seen scuttling about with 13 babies clinging to a mother. They also have more teeth than any other mammal — and a threatened opossum often bares those teeth as a warning before it collapses. Opossums, usually a southern animal common in the United States, Mexico and Central America, have been creeping north over the last few decades, a sign of climate change and urban sprawl.
In a city, there are lot more places to hide that might be warmer. And more food. Gates said he saw his first opossum in the mids — in Etobicoke, where Ford was born and still lives.
In the run of a year he might get a dozen opossum calls — usually from people who fear they are rats; by comparison he gets thousands of calls a year each for raccoons and squirrels. No need to wait until next weekend to score sweet sales on gadgets, gear.
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The possum, once an animal found strictly in the southern U. North America's only marsupial, with its rat-like tail and exposed nose and ears, is hardly suited for Canadian winters. But as the climate warms, it's one of thousands of species around the world that are extending their range northwards.
This summer, at a Toronto city council debate, former mayor and current councillor Rob Ford warned his colleagues they'd better start "watching" the "dangerous" menace. His statement elicited laughter from three wildlife experts on hand, who pointed out that possums don't chew, don't dig, won't go into your attic and are possibly the most harmless urban critters out there.
But in one sense the possum's foothold in Toronto does signal a vast menace: climate change. While melting icecaps and desertification can seem far from home, shifts in our own urban ecosystems signal climate change is having an impact right here. We are seeing that species best able to survive in warming cities are super-adapters.
Ones we'd better get used to living with. These super-adapters share a set of common traits, explains Dawn Bazely, a biology professor and former director of the Institute for Research and Innovation in Sustainability at York University. They're tolerant of a wide range of conditions like noise, light pollution, and a proximity to humans ; they have a non-specialist diet meaning they can eat just about anything ; and they tend to have relatively short reproductive cycles.
There are plenty of examples of how these creatures are adapting quickly. For instance, urban bears were found to alter their eating habits, becoming night owls so as to avoid detection. Some city birds, to be heard over the din of urban noise, thrive by shifting higher the frequency of their songs, which are essential to attracting mates, and therefore to breeding.
Crows have been observed dropping food packages in traffic and picking up the remains once vehicles have broken open the packaging. Coyotes have turned to small cats and dogs as food sources as their habitat becomes increasingly urbanized. Australian researchers monitored squirrels in a park in Manhattan's lower east side and found that they may actually fare better in urban environments, because there are fewer natural predators and because they've been able to tolerate a certain degree of human contact.
Not that all humans choose to tolerate more squirrel contact. In the summer of , a resident in Ottawa's trendy Westboro area blew the whistle on his neighbours, who had, he told a reporter, been capturing squirrels and shlepping them across the river to Quebec.
One international media outlet that picked up the story referred to Quebec as the "squirrel toilet" of Canada. An emerging field called eco-evolutionary dynamics suggests that species surviving and thriving in our warming and increasingly urbanized world are doing more than just adjusting their behaviours; they are actually evolving at a genetic level to the changes around them. For example, biologists have hypothesized that the reason why songbirds in North America are developing shorter, more pointed wings is because of forest fragmentation.
The National Opossum Society has lots of information and photos about this little creature, its lifestyle and habits. Possum Sightings from They're here and they sure are getting around! Close Help. Entering your Possum story is easy to do. Just type! Your story will appear on a Web page exactly the way you enter it here. TIP: Since most people scan Web pages, include your best thoughts in your first paragraph and tell us when, where and what you saw.
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I understand and accept the privacy policy. I understand that you will display my submission on your website. You can preview and edit on the next page. Possum sightings Not rated yet Checking a noise outside, I found a possum in the recycling box licking the empty ice cream container. It was not scared away by noises I made. We saw it digging in the snow.
It was likely eating under bird feeder … Cambridge Opossum Not rated yet I saw a possum on our patio in Cambridge Ontario last night, alerted by our cat who was all puffed tail, meowing loudly. It might have been after food … Possum sighting in Halton Hills Not rated yet I first spotted this Possum snacking under the birdfeeders on February 28, at dinner time.
Thank you for sending us this charming picture of a Possum, just look at that sweet little face! My dad live caught these two cuties while on the hunt for a MIA barn cat. They were cold and wet. Stayed in to warm up a bit before … Glenburnie Possum Not rated yet There's a possum hiding in the corner of our shed that shares a wall with our garage.
Thank you for sending this picture of the little visitor to your … Plentiful Possums Not rated yet Ron from Ballinafad wrote to say This funny looking guy sniffed … Recycling box Opossum Not rated yet This cute little guy scared the crap out of me on garbage day! I'm not sure if there were more in there, but I'll keep checking.
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