Tucked away in the back of our chook shed is a large aviary where three juvenile possums have been lovingly raised since they were the size of my palm. All three lost their mums in tragic face offs with cars and kind passer-bys have stopped and checked the pouches of the now angel mothers and saved these little girls.
By the sounds of the start of this post, you would imagine the girls to be gentle, squeaking balls of fluff that peer sweetly from their homemade possum boxes and tenderly take apples from my hand.
Wrong. So wrong.
What I have is three ferocious little ferals that literally bite the hand that feeds. But this is a good thing. What you don’t want is to raise pets. The point of wildlife rehabilitation is to raise wild animals so they are released and will survive.
I am raising Zina-The-Warrior-Princess brushtail possums!!
But they aren’t the reason I am brought to this laptop to share a story with you. My tale is more “me” focussed. Or more rightly “me possibly going to get arrested” focus. You see, I am a pilferer. A thief. A dark traveller who has a hidden talent for light fingered-ness.
The largest part of possum rehab is the gathering of fresh branches of native trees…”leaf” to the seasoned carer. Each day I need to provide fresh fodder for my girls so that they, upon awakening in the evening are greeted with native flowers, fresh juicy greenery and insects that will lure them into the great outdoors when the time is right.
One local council has provided a massive native reserve for just this sort of thing and as long as you are happy getting malaria, you can cut and clip as many branches as you’d like to transport to your home and ultimately fill your car with as many spiders and bugs that will no doubt run up your arm while you are on the highway. I swear, cars pulling up near to me must find it pretty exciting to watch me scream and stick my hand down my bra while waiting at the lights.
But that “fodder farm” is a huge drive each day, so I’ve been honing my skills at driving carefully around my neighbourhood during the quiet of the day, jumping out with my secateurs and clipping branches from trees hanging over onto the footpath. God, the excitement and exhilaration of it all. The thrill of finding lillypilly bonanzas just overflowing with new buds. The cheek of checking if anyone is in the front yard while I scurry in their underbrush. And the knowledge that I have a set of excuses if stopped…. a scientist taking tests of plants due to rare airborne virus? Surely I would be believed.
But all this stealing is all going to end, as these girls are set for re-release next weekend. That’s when the aviary door will be left open and they can start to come and go as they please for a while…until they get new digs up a tree…and hopefully not in someones roof. I hope that I will have equipped them with enough good health and strong muscles that they can run and swing from branches and be scared enough of people that they keep to themselves.
But I’m sure I will see them again….when the mangoes on our tree ripen.
Lisa Wright - Writer 