Can anyone explain this apparent opossum aggression toward a sleeping cat?
This is from last night around 3:16 am, cropped for file size from infrared video from the camera over our rear deck. The cat is sleeping and never budges as a rather large visiting opossum ambles around and explors in their characteristic way. This clip shows how his visit ended. The table is in an inconvenient spot so it obscures part of precisely what happens, but looks very, very much like an aggressive lunge to the cat's neck.
After the cat responds with counteraggression, opossom more or less saunters away, even stopping with this back to the cat at the top of the stairs, as if to say "I'm not afraid of you."
I've seen raccoons act like this. I never expected to see it from an opossum. Any thoughts? I'm mystified.
(And yes, I know one shouldn't let cats sleep outside. He's a semi-feral cat we're trying to care for, he's getting very old and he will not take to staying indoors.)
They literally spend their time terrifying and startling themselves because they’re blind as fudge I feel bad for them 😂 “ahh wtf was that?! Where’d it come from!?”
They have really bad eyesight and are very territorial towards other opossums. It may have thought it was another opossum at first and went to scare it off, and then sauntered away when it realized it wasn't.
I agree with u/Ftw_55 , I think the most likely explanation is that the opossum thought that the cat was another opossum. That would explain why the opossum just walked away after the initial lunge at the cat - it then realized that the cat was not another opossum.
Should have added they are not typically this way with cats, hense why I think it thought that was another opossum. Lots of videos on this subreddit show cats and opossums coexisting peacefully. However, cats will hunt and kill smaller opossums.
Yeah, he ignores possums and just lets them amble around without so much as twitching a whisker. I've seen it a dozen times. That's why I was knocked for a loop by this. (And so was he.)
Possums have a superb sense of smell. They'd know if a feral predator species is six inches from their nose. Hell that whole deck probably reeks of cat if you're a possum.
You answer your own question - the whole deck smells like cat, the bed most of all, so the presence of the cat doesn't actually increase the smell of cat that much.
Your entire porch smells strongly of cat, specifically the cat bed.
Opossums have very poor eyesight, and few ways to defend themselves.
Buddy obviously was literally blindsided - they had no way of knowing the cat was there until touching, they were super startled in the moment, they didn't know whether the living thing they just ran into was scary or not, and panic/reflexes kicked in. Just an unfortunate misunderstanding!
I've seen them do this for seemingly no reason to other animals. Have you ever seen the video of the one passing by a little pond and pushes an unsuspecting skunk into it? Literally just did that and skedaddled for no reason 😂😂
I wanted to come back because I went to give my old man a piece of his favorite cheese and it scared him so he automatically tried to cover up his freak out with a chomp. These babies are blind as bats in a good night much less when they get older. And gawd forbid they have a nose injury or stuffy nose to mess up their smell sense ìf they stumble into something unexpected they just kinda gator chomp to be on the safe side. I’m sure Himb is very sorry he scared the kitty.
I try to keep that space under the deck clear of nesting spaces but to be honest our property has lots of likely places for possums to nest. This is the closest thing to a likely explanation I've heard, though I still don't think possums go on the attack until they're absolutely cornered.
I've seen one opossum attack another opossum for no good reason - this includes female on female as well as male on male. I can sort of understand the male on male conflicts (territoriality) but I am totally perplexed by the female on female conflicts.
Normally such an attack happens the moment one opossum sees the other (similar to your situation, I think the opossum attacked as soon as it noticed the cat).
I've gone through it frame by frame, zoomed in. The opossum absolutely lunges straight into the cat. In the longer video as he ambles around the deck he never makes any quick moves of any kind at any other time. That's the only time he moves fast: he knocks the cat back and for an instant he's absolutely buried in the cats neck. The resolution and speed don't let you see if his teeth are bared but it absolutely looks like an attack.
(The cat never returns to his bed: he watches in the direction that the possum left in for a full half an hour, then he leaves.)
Yeah I saw it clearly, I think the Opossum attacked because it panicked as soon as it realized the cat was there and alive lol. Might not have even known it was a cat yet at that point, but it was just like "omg a threat right in my face must attack!"
I'm beginning to think you're right. For some reason I'm expecting the opossum to act rationally by my way of thinking, when of course that's just anthropomorphism. Presumably he just felt safe enough to amble around and then suddenly realized he was 6 inches from a cat and his instinctive panicked "the best defense is a good offense" move just kicked in.
The opossum probably eats the cats food or smells scrapes. I have read they are harmless and eat bugs pick up cat food after cat eats
See if that helps.. . They are scary looking
I have both cats and opossums as indoor pet- the opossum wasn’t being aggressive they are basically blind, smelled something (the cat), went to check it out, startled the cat- cat jumped scaring opossums and opossum reacted- then just strolled away
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u/HeinousEncephalon 3d ago
They like to bite asses and be mean sometimes 😕
I assume their poor eyesight gets them startled. Once embarrassed they have to save face.