Perhaps the most intriguing characteristic is the opossum's ability to play dead. When confronted by danger, it can either make a run for it, climb a nearby tree, stay and fight (which it rarely does), or feign death.

While the Oz ones can play dead, they can certainly fight! Another myth popular among biologists is that, before people came to Oz, the only mammals in Oz were marsupials and they were restricted to Oz (pace the American opossum) because they couldn't compete with or outfight placental mammals.

Try telling that one to the feral cats outside University House, in Melbourne when, every night, they compete with the possums and have to fight them over the garbage bins.

Cheers, Rowan