I have profoundly hated these nasty critters based on the assumption they kill chickens
for sport! Justifying shooting them on sight. Recently a friend explained the M.O.behind
what we considered to be murder.
Alligators and opossums share a specific trait, they both kill their prey only to return a
few days later to feed, the decomposition process allows the meat to be tenderized !
As most people bury or at least relocate chicken carcasses we seldom see the second
phase with the exemption of Alligators which cannot chew. As I have seen two prized
Billy goats used for breeding floating in my 18' deep pond. When they are disgusting
enough they are devoured in the following manner, the gator will bite a large section
of it's meal(1200 lbs of pressure ?) then they do the "death roll" tearing the bitten area
off so they can swallow it whole and so on. opossums can chew and have razor sharp
claws and teeth. The fact is I don't know having never actually seen one feed.
I can share this from experience, as mentioned in Granny's time tested methods. We
as young as 12 were given a .22 cal rifle with 5 bullets .when we hunted squirrels or
rabbits, Uncle Ben expected 5 animals. We took this very seriously as a belt applied
any failures.We trapped Opossums with live traps far from the flock, after cousin Ben
proved his grit by dispatching them with a Buck knife(bear in mind each shell had to
have a squirrel or rabbit in it's place) he ended up with quite a few stitches one day.
After that we learned that a opossum can hold it's breath for 5-7 minutes, we clipped
a dog leash to the live trap and threw it in the pond. Bear in mind it wasn't worth a.22
or the whipping we got for "wasting a shell". Although this bothered me it was much
less painful than the belt. I believe anything you kill should be eaten, as I gagged on
Opossum only one time ,I've discovered hogs love them. Raccoons however make a
tasty meal similar to pork if cooked properly. All of this began 35 years ago my take
on it has evolved exponentially ! Although when a coon is caught live or not I have a
list of six men who will come in an hour or less for fresh coon and believe me or not.
They consider coon to be a delicacy. RR
for sport! Justifying shooting them on sight. Recently a friend explained the M.O.behind
what we considered to be murder.
Alligators and opossums share a specific trait, they both kill their prey only to return a
few days later to feed, the decomposition process allows the meat to be tenderized !
As most people bury or at least relocate chicken carcasses we seldom see the second
phase with the exemption of Alligators which cannot chew. As I have seen two prized
Billy goats used for breeding floating in my 18' deep pond. When they are disgusting
enough they are devoured in the following manner, the gator will bite a large section
of it's meal(1200 lbs of pressure ?) then they do the "death roll" tearing the bitten area
off so they can swallow it whole and so on. opossums can chew and have razor sharp
claws and teeth. The fact is I don't know having never actually seen one feed.
I can share this from experience, as mentioned in Granny's time tested methods. We
as young as 12 were given a .22 cal rifle with 5 bullets .when we hunted squirrels or
rabbits, Uncle Ben expected 5 animals. We took this very seriously as a belt applied
any failures.We trapped Opossums with live traps far from the flock, after cousin Ben
proved his grit by dispatching them with a Buck knife(bear in mind each shell had to
have a squirrel or rabbit in it's place) he ended up with quite a few stitches one day.
After that we learned that a opossum can hold it's breath for 5-7 minutes, we clipped
a dog leash to the live trap and threw it in the pond. Bear in mind it wasn't worth a.22
or the whipping we got for "wasting a shell". Although this bothered me it was much
less painful than the belt. I believe anything you kill should be eaten, as I gagged on
Opossum only one time ,I've discovered hogs love them. Raccoons however make a
tasty meal similar to pork if cooked properly. All of this began 35 years ago my take
on it has evolved exponentially ! Although when a coon is caught live or not I have a
list of six men who will come in an hour or less for fresh coon and believe me or not.
They consider coon to be a delicacy. RR
Last edited:
