Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 19, 2025
We hoped also to have witnessed their manner of living in the woods, and the resources they rely upon in their journeys. Nothing, however, of this sort had yet occurred, except their examining some trees to see if they could discover on the bark any marks of the claws of squirrels and opossums, which they said would show whether any of those animals were hidden among the leaves and branches.
A terrible hullabaloo between a pair of Opossums up a neighbouring gum tree arrested the attention of both Dot and the Koala. Presently the sounds of snarling, spitting, and screaming ended, and an Opossum climbed out to the far end of a branch, where the moonlight shone on his grey fur like silver.
"Opossums and raccoons are well-known denizens of trees, and both furnish famous country sports, especially in the South. ''Possum up de gum-tree, cooney in de hollow, is a line from a negro ditty that touches a deep chord in the African heart. The former is found not infrequently in this region, but the Hudson seems to be the eastern boundary of its habitat."
In this collection there are extinct species of all the thirty-two genera, excepting four, of the terrestrial quadrupeds now inhabiting the provinces in which the caves occur; and the extinct species are much more numerous than those now living: there are fossil ant-eaters, armadillos, tapirs, peccaries, guanacos, opossums, and numerous South American gnawers and monkeys, and other animals.
The terrestrial species are nocturnal in their habits, sleeping during the day in hollow trees, and coming forth at night to prey on birds in their roosting places. It is very difficult to rear poultry in this country on account of these small opossums, scarcely a night passing, in some parts, in which the fowls are not attacked by them. August 5th.
A fellow naturalist of mine never lost an opportunity to set innumerable traps for the lesser jungle-folk, such as mice and opossums, all of which he religiously measured and skinned, so that each, in its death, should add its mite to human knowledge. As a fisherman runs out set lines, so would he place his traps in a circle under his hammock, using a cord to tie each and every one to the meshes.
After they had been about four months out, they began to play truant, to desert Dr Leichhardt when reconnoitring, taking the provisions with them, and to wander away without permission in quest of honey and opossums.
The cockatoos came down in such clouds as almost to whiten the ground, and made short work of the maize; the bandicoots and the township pigs dug up and devoured the sweet potatoes, just as they were becoming large enough for use commend me to your half-starved pig to find out in a moment where the juiciest and finest esculent lies buried and the chattering little opossums stripped the peach-trees of their wealth, in which labour of love they were eagerly assisted by the flying-foxes during the night, whilst any that had escaped these nocturnal depredators became the spoil of two or three idle boys, who loafed about all day, seeking mischief, and, as always happens, succeeding in finding it, even in this sequestered region.
These, and many other adventures with wolves and wolverenes, with panthers and peccaries, and porcupines and opossums, I might detail to you; but no doubt you are already wearied with the length of my story. "It is now nearly ten years since our arrival in this valley oasis. During all that time, we have lived contented and happy; and God has favoured our efforts, and crowned them with success.
In Reptiles, the mass of the brain, relatively to the spinal cord, increases and the cerebral hemispheres begin to predominate over the other parts; while in Birds this predominance is still more marked. The brain of the lowest Mammals, such as the duck-billed Platypus and the Opossums and Kangaroos, exhibits a still more definite advance in the same direction.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking