Oh 'Possum!

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But most remarkable of all is the animal's reproductive system. The opossum is our continent's only marsupial, the sole remaining ancestor of opossum-like creatures that roamed North American dinosaur back yards 100 million years ago. Like other marsupials, most of which now live in Australia and South America, female opossums give birth to "living embryos" a mere 12 to 14 days after conception.

Between 14 and 18 immature newborns — blind, furless and the size of navy beans — clamber up through the mother's belly fur and enter her pouch. There, the race is on for one of her 13 nipples, to which the winners attach themselves and suckle (the losers ... well, lose). Two months later, the young have developed enough to emerge from the pouch and cling to their mother's back as she rambles about at night, sniffing for food. In another three or four weeks, the young will be on their own. When they're just 7 to 8 months old, those babies can start making babies, too.

Given the opossum's exceedingly short life span for an animal its size — a fleeting 18 months — the species likely would have died out long ago without this remarkably efficient and prolific reproductive strategy. Even conception has been made doubly sure in the opossum. The female's reproductive tract is branched and leads to not one but two side-by-side uteri. Correspondingly, the male possesses a "double pronger," or less euphemistically, a forked penis, that sends sperm swimming in pairs, one for each uterus. The male's unusual equipment, made the more so by its bluish-purple color, fathered the myth that opossums mate through the nose of the female, who then, after waiting two weeks, sneezes the young into her pouch.

DEAD OR ALIVE?

Of course, the best known of all myths and half-truths concerning the opossum is that, when faced with danger, it plays dead.

Actually, given any option, the humble opossum will lowtail it in the opposite direction of a threat. And when cornered, an opossum's demeanor is anything but lifeless — it'll bare all 50 of its pointed teeth and hiss ferociously. That behavior really is an act, since the animal is easy quarry. Even a mildly determined human can chase down an opossum running at full shuffle.

It's only when the creature is attacked or caught that it shifts into the mode we call "playing 'possum:" Its back and toes curl, the tongue lolls out, the body goes limp, and its breathing seems to cease. Its bowels empty. Poke it, prod it — no response.

Mighty good acting, if it was an act. But most scientists now agree that a conked-out opossum really is out, involuntarily cast by its fear-stricken nervous system into a catatonic state. The animal is oblivious to pain and rough treatment, right down to its reflexes. You can touch its eyeballs and it won't blink.

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