Exotic Pets Part Four - Short-tail Opposum

When the average person thinks of Opossums, they think the large, ugly, and mean Virginia Opossum lying dead in the road or hanging from a tree branch by its tail (this, by the way, is a myth). The Short-tailed Opossum is not large. Or ugly. Or mean.

You probably already know of another pet Opossum: the Sugar Glider, though perhaps (unless you have read this blog for a long time) you did not know that they were Opossums.

Before I right any more, I'd better show you what a Short-tailed Opossum looks like:

Cute, right? I thought so.

The type of Short-tailed Opossum most likely to be found in the pet trade is the one in the picture: the Gray Short-tailed Opossum, Monodelphis domestica. Domestica!? Yes, these are domesticated, not to be pets, but to experiment on.

One of these guys will set you back about a hundred dollars. They can live in a cage ( a rat sized one would work) or an aquarium.

Short-tailed Opossums are not hard to keep, and they can become tame.