Pistachio fell out of her Mom's pouch into some leaves and was nearly blown away with them! Her rescuer noticed a tiny gray being rolling away and scooped her up to safety. Bethany brought her to me on August 7, and I could tell she was a special little girl.
Pistachio was my first dwarf opossum out of the approximately 1000 opossums I’ve worked with. She had a smooshed face, a shortened snout, and an underbite. Her body was very small for her developmental age. It’s no surprise she couldn’t hold on in Mom’s pouch, she wasn’t very strong.
In the beginning
Initially, Pistachio (named after a nut theme the finder family gives to their wild opossum friends) was so weak, she could barely hold her head up. When I helped her to stand she shook under the effort and would collapse. I worked with her several times a day to build strength in her muscles, and fed her with a tube at the beginning. She wasn’t even strong enough to lap from a syringe. I normally tube infant opossums, anyways, and she was only 28 grams.
Success!
Eventually the physical therapy started working and she could walk, wobbly at first, and then with more determination. Her little spirit was starting to show!
I no longer had to tube feed her; she became adept at licking formula from a syringe and enjoyed special treats of yogurt.
Learning to eat
She needed to be fed with a syringe for most of the time she was here, although she did finally learn to lap formula from a dish, and pick up and chew on small solids.Â
Health challenges
A couple times she had to go on antibiotics after aspirating her formula- that snout was just too close to the milk! She had a great appetite and was always excited about meal times.
Miss Independent
It wasn’t until the last 10 days that she started being able to go to the bathroom on her own, without being stimulated (much like a Mama cat or dog does with their young).Â
Once she developed that skill, she was unstoppable! She became very independent and the cuddly, sleepy baby was a thing of the past.
