AUSTRALIAN GREY OPOSSUM, OR PHALANGER.
On account of its "foxy" appearance, this species is also known as the Vulpine Phalanger.
Photo by W. Saville-Kent, F.Z.S.] [Milford-on-Sea.
FRONT VIEW OF GREY OPOSSUM, OR PHALANGER.
Displays the bare under-surface of the prehensile tail.
The ring-tailed opossums differ essentially from the common opossum or phalanger and its allies in their life habits. While these latter habitually take up their abode and bring forth their young in hollow trees, the ring-tailed species construct a regular nest of interlaced sticks, leaves, grass, or any other available material for their domicile. The structure much resembles the nest, or "drey," of our own familiar European squirrel, and may be perched high up among the tree branches or within only a few feet from the ground among the scrub thickets. In New Guinea a variety of these ring-tailed phalangers occurs, not found in Australia, which has no white tip to its tail, and the ears are very short and wide. The group as represented by this species leads to the consideration of the so-called Cuscuses or typical phalangers indigenous to New Guinea and North Queensland, though but rarely seen there, which, as an exception to the Marsupial Tribe, are distributed among the Indo-Malay Islands as far westward as Celebes. In the cuscuses the tail is altogether naked, and pre-eminently prehensile throughout almost its entire terminal moiety; the ears are round and, proportionately, exceedingly small; while the fur is very short, thick, and woolly. Compared with the opossums or phalangers, the cuscuses are very dull and sluggish in their movements, creeping slowly among the branches of the trees to browse on the fruit and leaves which constitute their principal diet. Like the opossums, however, or even to a greater extent, they vary this vegetarian regimen with insects or an occasionally captured bird.
Photo by W. Saville-Kent, F.Z.S.] [Milford-on-Sea.
PROFILE VIEW OF GREY OPOSSUM, OR PHALANGER.