Feature Stroy

Opossums

Beginning in March, my life was no longer my own. Tiny neonate opossums weighing a mere 12 grams each began to arrive for care. This, for me, meant planning everything around their care and demanding schedule. I tub ally fed these diminuitive marsupials at 7 AM, 11 AM, 3 PM, 7 PM, and 11 PM, and 3 AM, from March until June, and at one point, feeding 14 of them took a good hour and a half per feeding (six times per day). Even a brief trip to purchase groceries had to be carefully timed between the babies' feeding schedule as well as dental appointments, business meetings, and meeting with volunteers to exchange animals or supplies. Finally, the last little opossum weighed 28 grams, and I slept through the night, skipping the 3 AM feeding. Oh, what
a simple pleasure it was not to awaken in the middle of the night. It lasted all of two weeks. On the way to an appointment with the cardiologist, Ron stopped to check the pouch of a road-killed female opossum. Sure enough, there were three live babies in her pouch. Ron called me stating that they looked to be about 20 grams, and I offered to meet him so that he would not have to drive all the way back. This worked out, and he was not late for his appointment.
Once back at the Center, I weighed the hairless, wiggling orphans and audibly groaned. They were 12 grams apiece, and I would be back to my grueling schedule once more. I also passed the word to our volunteers-I had middle ofthe night feedings and could take other babies needing round the clock care. There certainly was no sense in two or three of us doing this. I received another 12 gram opossum from volunteer, Lindy Williams, and a 130 gram baby raccoon (Missy) from Leslie Johnson. Both of these babies were added to the schedule of 6 feedings, every 4 hours. By July, I received a batch of 7 babies whose mother was killed by a dog, and several other small groups, giv ing a total of 16, with 11 of those being tub ally fed.
We received more than 100 baby opossums this spring, but fortunately some were a bit bigger and did not require as much hands-on care. Leslie Johnson raised a boat load for us which really helped alot. Each time that a group began to lick their formula from a dish, I would become like a kid on Christmas morning-for now I could feed a large group in the time that it took to heat and pour the formula, saving hours of time per day.
The photo above, left, is of a group of babies doing just that-drinking their Puppy Milk Replacer from a shallow dish all on their own-what a beautiful sight! They weighed 35 grams at this point. The photo,above, right, is of a group of 12-gram babies. These are tube fed for about 6-8 weeks until they can feed from a shallow bowl on their own.

Gray Foxes

On May 16, we received four baby fox cubs from the gulf coast of Florida from a rehab facility
that did not have caging to raise them. Volunteers, Leslie Johnson and Ethel Huggins, drove all the way to Wildwood, to help in transporting the babies to our facility. They are three males and one femate-an-d absolutely gorgeous. When they were first admitted for care, they received-Puppy Milk Replacer (Esbi1ac) which they drank from a bowl as well as soft canned dog food mixed with carnivore diet. After a few weeks, they no longer required the milk formula. The photo at the top was taken when they arrived, and the photo at the bottom was taken two months later.
Gray foxes are the only fox with the ability to climb well. They are very intelligent and are loving, devoted parents to their cubs.

White Tail Deer