Opossums Overrun Brooklyn, Fail To Eliminate Rats

__roo writes "In a bizarre case of life imitates the Simpsons, New York City officials introduced a population of opossums into Brooklyn parks and under the boardwalk at Coney Island, apparently convinced that the opossums would eat all of the rats in the borough and then conveniently die of starvation. Several years later, the opossums have not only failed to eliminate the rat epidemic from New York City, but they have thrived, turning into a sharp-toothed, foul-odored epidemic of their own."

Comments

The obvious solution

[elrous0]

Based on my experience, automobiles seem to work wonders on these things. Clearly, we just need to bring in more automobiles to New York.

Re:The obvious solution

[Locke2005]

The automobiles aren't really killing them. Those flattened possums are just playing dead; I see them get up and walk away all the time... or was that Wiley Coyote? I forget.

Hipsters

[Sonny Yatsen]

Just tell the hipsters in Brooklyn that it's totally ironic to wear live Opossums on their heads. Kill two birds with one stone.

Re:Hipsters

[Pojut]

More like kill two sharp-toothed, foul-odored epidemics with one stone.

Re:Hipsters

[Abstrackt]

Mod this post up!

How very meta.

Obligatory Simpsons

[Drakkenmensch]

Just bring in a colony of ferocious lions to eat the possums. When the lions become a problem, bring in gorillas to fight the lions. Then in winter the cold will kill the gorillas. Problem solved!

Remember the old lady

[egandalf]

Did they learn nothing from the story of the old lady who swallowed a fly?

Poor thing. I hear she died.

Wild Animals Should Stay In the Wild

[Bing Tsher E]

We had to deal with a bold, insane, possibly rabid raccoon on the front porch last week. Believe me, it's scary when the wild animals decide they're not afraid of you at all.

Re:Wild Animals Should Stay In the Wild

[vux984]

Yep, because discharging a firearm at night in an urban setting to kill rodents and small mamalls is an intelligent thing to do.

Re:Wild Animals Should Stay In the Wild

[treeves]

Hmmmm....why not split the difference and use a .2215? Are they hard to find?

Re:Wild Animals Should Stay In the Wild

[StikyPad]

I found a possum in my trashcan many years ago. Feeling brave and heroic (aka scared and freaked out), I loaded up my air rifle with a .177 pointed pellet, gave it a full 10 pumps, and shot the possum basically point blank in the upper body. It was difficult to tell where it hit exactly due to all the fur and thrashing, but suffice to say that it did not die -- much to our mutual chagrin. Neither did it perish after the increasingly distressing 5 attempts at a coup de grace using BBs from the reservoir. I ended up having to retrieve and load another pellet and shoot it in the head to finally put it out of its misery.

After it was dead, I went to get a shovel only to came back and discover that it was not actually dead, as it had tipped over the trashcan and escaped. Turns out "playing possum" is a real thing after all.

Personally, I would not recommend air rifles for shooting possums, or any other "varmints" for that matter. Even if you're a good shot, even if you *can't miss*, there's a significant chance that you will not kill it, and having a wounded animal running is not a good thing. For starters, there's the natural displeasure of having inflicted needless suffering (which may sound "unmanly," or inconsequential until you've actually experienced it), but also there's the practical reality that you've just created an increased risk to pets, children, etc., (which also feels pretty shitty).

That said, I don't have a problem with people killing animals, be it for pest elimination or for sport, but inexperienced would-be shooters should be fully aware that shooting something doesn't necessarily equate to killing it, especially with an underpowered gun. If you're in an area where it's illegal to discharge a firearm (which is the case for the vast majority of residential areas), you should probably just stick to traps.

Re:Wild Animals Should Stay In the Wild

[Tuidjy]

One night I got a call from my wife - she met some beasty on the path from the complex's gate to the apartment's front door, and the stupid thing stood its ground, got on its two hind legs, and started waving its paws and hissing at her. Something had been clawing our cat, so I was feeling pretty murderous - I took my recurve, and two arrows and went to see what was what.

It was a oversized raccoon, and it was really standing its ground - it could have ran in the bushes or through the pool's fence, but did not, even though we were on both sides of it. I was afraid I would miss it (I had never shot my bow at anything but targets) so I made my wife go back to the car, i.e. out of the line of fire. I'm glad I did, because the arrow went clean through the raccoon, bounced off the concrete path, and took out a finger worth of wood from a wall. I realize now it was a damn stupid thing to do, as I had really underestimated what my bow could do.

Shooting a gun in the same situation seem even more irresponsible - the bullet may just go through the critter, and end up into one of your neighbors.

In any case, we called animal control, and I got a sermon from the Sheriff deputy about firing the bow inside the apartment complex. She said that she could have brought me in front of a judge for it, but she let it slide.

Two days later, the animal control people wanted to check both me and my wife for scratches - the raccoon turned out to have been rabid... I guess we were both very lucky that night, despite doing so many things wrong - she stood nearby when she should have gone back to the car, I came up on the raccoon and could have scared it into attacking her, and then I shot a 65 pound bow in the middle of a bunch of dry wall buildings.

Re:as always, humans are weak in the mind

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a mighty nice soapbox you have there.

With a stick and some string, you'd have an even better possum trap.

Re:Alligators

[julesh]

Bring in alligators to eat the opossum, and then in the winter, they'll all freeze to death.

A friend keeps singing a song to her kid about an alligator going snap. I keep telling her she'll need liquid oxygen to achieve that, but I don't think she's got the message.

Re:possum is a food group here in alabama.

[dkleinsc]

Badgers? Badgers? We don't need no stinkin' badgers!

Common sense...

[MikeRT]

Maybe I have the benefit of experience, having lived in the south and all, but WHO WOULD BE SO F#$%ING STUPID AS TO USE POSSUMS FOR PEST CONTROL?

The damn things are like the mammalian answer to cockroaches. If they didn't have typical mammalian susceptibility to radiation, odds on them among southerners would be 10:1, their favor against roaches to survive a nuclear holocaust by eating the remaining roaches and being the last species standing.

Re:Common sense...

[SatanicPuppy]

They're not as bad as rats, but it blows my mind to think that someone somewhere thought of the possum as a predator. They will hunt, but only if there is no ready supply of garbage. New York is their promised land.

They'd have been better off importing bobcats. Though, of course, importing predators into New York to kill their pests is doomed: the pests are so commonly poisoned, that they're very likely to kill anything that eats them. That's a common problem with the falcons who feed on pigeons.

Re:Common sense...

[Albertosaurus]

Maybe I have the benefit of experience, having lived in the south and all, but WHO WOULD BE SO F#$%ING STUPID AS TO USE POSSUMS FOR PEST CONTROL?

New Yorkers, apparently.

And now i will imitate the Simpsons

[shadowrat]

HA HA!

Re:possum is a food group here in alabama.

[RobertB-DC]

Seriously though, no one in their right mind down here would try to destroy a rat problem with a possum problem. Matter of fact, anyone that doesn't call them 'possum' doesn't really have any experience with the nasty things

I'm with you -- what the hell were they thinking? Anyone from south of the Mason Dixon line would know damned well that turning possums loose on NYC would lead to complete chaos. The possum's preferred meal is Your Garbage, and a NYC alleyway is a possum's smorgasbord.

But I do have an alternate theory. Someone from the Big City came down South and said something stupid about the size of our "rats". Someone from the Little Southern Town said, "We call 'em 'possums', and they'd eat your so-called Noo Yawk rats for breakfast". The city slicker promptly requested a truckload be delivered, and my cousin Bubba gladly obliged... knowing exactly what lay in store for Mr. Smarty-Pants from the city.

Or it could have been an evil plot to wreak toothy, naked-tailed revenge for the wrongs inflicted upon the South during the Civil War... oh, sorry, I mean "War of Northern Aggression". YMMV.

New York Post article ...

[Spectre]

I know this is Idle, but still.

Newspapers: New York Times, Washington Post.

Tabloids: New York Post, Washington Times.

If this is a real story, is there a real paper carrying it somewhere?

Sort of, here's a United Press International feed: http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2010/09/19/Immigrant-opossums-adapt-to-Brooklyn/UPI-90141284911712/

WIKIPEDIA

[immakiku]

Their unspecialized biology, flexible diet and reproductive strategy make them successful colonizers and survivors in diverse locations and conditions.

If they had just read the first two paragraphs in wikipedia, they'd know possums don't just "die off" after there's no more rats.

Re:possum is a food group here in alabama.

[lexidation]

They just show their teeth and hiss? What the fuck would you do if someone trapped you in a garbage can and started poking sticks at you? You expect the little fucker to greet you?

No kidding

[sean.peters]

The whole idea is almost mind-bogglingly dumb. Where did they get the idea that possums would eat rats? They mostly eat carrion and bugs.

Maybe for their next trick they can introduce a herd of cows... you know, to eat the possums.

Re:possum is a food group here in alabama.

[Anonymous Coward]

"Excuse me, kind sir, but could you kindly tip this garbage receptacle at such an angle as to let me escape my confinement? I would be mighty grateful, if so." That would help; as would a tip of his top hat. He also wears a monocle.