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The common ringtail possum (Pseudocheirus peregrinus, Greek for "false hand" and Latin for "pilgrim" or "alien") is an Australian marsupial. It lives in a variety of habitats and eats a variety of leaves of both native and introduced plants, as well as flowers, fruits and sap.
Opossums eat insects, rodents, birds, eggs, frogs, plants, fruits and grain. Some species may eat the skeletal remains of rodents and roadkill animals to fulfill their calcium requirements. [ 45 ] In captivity, opossums will eat practically anything including dog and cat food, livestock fodder and discarded human food scraps and waste.
The common opossum (Didelphis marsupialis), also called the southern or black-eared opossum [2] or gambá, and sometimes called a possum, is a marsupial species living from the northeast of Mexico to Bolivia (reaching the coast of the South Pacific Ocean to the central coast of Peru), including Trinidad and Tobago and the Windwards in the Caribbean, [2] where it is called manicou. [3]
Brushtail possums may eat three or four different plant species during a foraging trip, unlike some other arboreal marsupials, such as the koala and the greater glider, which focus on single species. The brushtail possum's rounded molars cannot cut Eucalyptus leaves as finely as more specialised feeders. They are more adapted to crushing their ...
Like raccoons, opossums can be found in urban environments, where they eat pet food, rotten fruit, and human garbage. They also are considered a common predator of poultry farming in North America. [ 58 ] [ 59 ] Research suggests that proximity to humans causes an increase in body size for opossums living in or near urban environments. [ 60 ]
Most possums conserve the functions of the epipubic bones. The exception is Trichosurus , which remarkably among marsupials has shifted the hypaxial muscles from the epipubic to the pelvis , employing a more placental -like breathing, having lost the benefits of the epipubic in regards to lung ventilation.
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The term "opossum" is used to refer to American species (though "possum" is a common abbreviation), while similar Australian species are properly called "possums". Isolated petrosals of Djarthia murgonensis , Australia's oldest marsupial fossils [ 71 ] Dentition of the herbivorous eastern grey kangaroo, as illustrated in Knight's Sketches in ...