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Christmas Tree Opossum Surprises Pa. Teen
San Francisco Chronicle ^ | 12/122/05 | AP

Posted on 12/22/2005 7:38:59 PM PST by TFFKAMM

(12-22) 19:23 PST ENGLEWOOD, Pa. (AP) --

Mary Kathleen O'Connor, 16, doing some studying for school about 6 a.m. Tuesday, said she was the first to be startled by an apparent Christmas tree stowaway.

"I'm looking at the tree and the angel just pops off," she said. "And a second later, this head just popped up. The eyes were, like, glowing. I was thinking, 'Oh my God!' And I screamed."

Other family members came running. "We looked at it and I thought it might have been a fake," said her father, Michael O'Connor, a Frackville attorney. "But then it moved its head. And I thought 'Holy Jeez. We're in trouble.'"

O'Connor called police, and William E. O'Donnell, a state Game Commission deputy wildlife conservation officer, removed an 18-inch-long opossum from the 8-foot Douglas fir the family had bought, bundled, from a dealer in Seltzer.

O'Donnell caged the animal and released it in woods about five miles away. The tree, meanwhile, was still in the front yard where Patricia had hurled it. "The lights are still on it," Michael O'Connor said. "So is the stand."

(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...


TOPICS: Local News
KEYWORDS: christmas; christmastree; marsupial; opossum; possum; wildlife

1 posted on 12/22/2005 7:39:01 PM PST by TFFKAMM
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To: TFFKAMM

That'd freak me out too. LOL


2 posted on 12/22/2005 7:41:17 PM PST by yldstrk (My heros have always been cowboys-Reagan and Bush)
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To: TFFKAMM
Not possums, but close....

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

3 posted on 12/22/2005 7:46:01 PM PST by digger48
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To: digger48

4 posted on 12/22/2005 7:50:06 PM PST by TFFKAMM
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To: digger48

Cute little critters. Used to have a hedgehog named Velcro.


5 posted on 12/22/2005 7:57:51 PM PST by barker (Santa, I can explain.....)
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To: barker

That was in an E-mail I got. It was marked as porcupines. At first glance, I believed them to be hedgehogs.

Your opinion?


6 posted on 12/22/2005 8:05:07 PM PST by digger48
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To: digger48

Hemorrhoids.


7 posted on 12/22/2005 8:18:45 PM PST by 43north (Liberals are obsessed by the vulgarity of their lives & the obscenity of their behavior.)
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To: digger48

We should slip a few of those into National Security Archives folders just in case Sandy Berger ever visits again.


8 posted on 12/22/2005 8:28:18 PM PST by piasa (Attitude Adjustments Offered Here Free of Charge)
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To: 43north
Hemorrhoids, indeed!

Perhaps a new variety.

How about Hemorroidus Pricklypear as a scientific name for this peculiar critter?

9 posted on 12/22/2005 8:49:45 PM PST by skeptoid
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To: TFFKAMM

10 posted on 12/22/2005 8:54:11 PM PST by Samwise (I freep; therefore, I am.)
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To: TFFKAMM
Great story. I read on this page of trivia that possums have 13 nipples!
11 posted on 12/22/2005 9:08:32 PM PST by FreeKeys (Merry Christmas Everybody!)
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To: digger48

Positive they are hedgehogs.


12 posted on 12/23/2005 3:35:56 AM PST by barker (Santa, I can explain.....)
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To: Slings and Arrows; Lijahsbubbe
'possum ping
13 posted on 12/23/2005 4:53:58 AM PST by Do not dub me shapka broham
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To: TFFKAMM
a possum and her 8 "children" once surprised me in my lawn mower bag. The first mow of the year only to find my bag was very heavy "after" mowing the lawn and out popped mom, who was probably in shock, and her offspring clinging on to her back. The grass left in the bag from the previous yr. must have been a nice soft area to spawn..
14 posted on 12/25/2006 9:56:43 PM PST by Coleus (Merry Christmas)
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To: IncPen

LOL


15 posted on 12/25/2006 10:00:19 PM PST by Nailbiter
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