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A
friend of mine, Mal, rang me to tell me he'd found a dead possum
on the side of the road and it had a tiny possum in the pouch.
It was really late at night so I asked him to bundle the corpse
into towels and keep it as warm as possible. The next day I collected
the possum, and into my life enters Kaysha, the tiniest possum
I had ever seen.
I
had to cut the pouch open with a pair of scissors so Kaysha wouldn't
be hurt when we got her out. YUK!
Kaysha
was cold when we got her out of the pouch and she was dehydrated,
so we gave her some warm fluids to
re-hydrate her and give her some energy.
We
then bundled her up into lots of warm wrappings and we took turns
in putting her down our jumpers, close to our hearts, to keep
her warm.
A
few hours later we weighed her as it is important to know exactly
how heavy (or should I say light) they are to guestimate their
age and to give them the correct amount of milk.
Kaysha
weighed in at a tiny 36 grams, lighter than a chocolate bar! Her
eyes were still closed and her ears only just up so we knew it
was going to be hard job as possums at this size rarely survive.
But we thought we'd try anyway.
Todd
made a humidicrib for Kaysha as furless critters need humid air
and warmth to survive. We set it to 32 degrees and put a tub of
water underneath the shelve where Kaysha would be placed in her
wooly wrappings. The humidicrib was powered by a black light globe
set to a thermostat so that it would go on and off to keep the
air at the right temperature. Quite ingenious we thought!
We
fed Kaysha Di-Vetalact, which is a low-lactose milk substitute
for animals (never give a native animal cows milk - it will make
them very sick!). She was so tiny that we had to feed her with
a 1ml syringe every few hours, even through the night, which was
really hard for two sleeper lovers!! Todd and I took turns in
getting up to feed her, it was hard, but also very rewarding.
We bonded very quickly with this adorable little creature.
Which
made the end pretty hard to bare. On the third morning of Kaysha's
life with us, we got out of bed to find her dead in her humidicrib.
We
had found blood in her faeces on the second day so she may have
had internal injuries from the accident. Maybe it was just because
she was too small and couldn't make it without her mum.
But
it may have been human error.
We
were constantly paranoid that she wasn't warm enough. We read
about caring for furless mammals and knew the temperature should
be around 32 degrees. We had set the temperature to 32 degrees,
but our thermostat was showing it was a little less so we turned
the heat up a wee notch. We wondered if we made it too hot, although
we did what the books said.
It
was a pretty dreadful time for Todd and I and one that we will
never ever forget.
It
is truly amazing how such a tiny little creature can make such
a huge impact on a persons life.
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