And Virginia Opossums are present again in Umatilla County, as I've seen
them both dead on the road (Turkey Vulture dining on same) and alive in and
around farm yards in the Stanfield area over the past two years.

Dennis Rockwell
Kennewick, WA
dennisrockwell at verizon.net
----- Original Message -----
From: "Mike Patterson" <celata at pacifier.com>
To: "Tweeters" <tweeters at u.washington.edu>
Sent: Friday, January 25, 2008 6:37 PM
Subject: [Tweeters] Re: [non] native mammals


> From: Verts, B.J. and L.N.Carraway. 1998. Land Mammals of
> Oregon. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA.
>
> Distribution.- The Virginia opossum is broadly distributed
> in North America east of the Rocky Mountains and in Central
> America; it was introduced into western North America.
>
> The first introduction in Oregon was near McKay Creek,
> Umatilla Co., between 1910 and 1921 (Jewett and Dobyns,1929).
> A population apparently was established there as trappers
> reported catching 212 animals during the 1927-1928 trapping
> season and a specimen collected in the area in 1928 is on
> deposit at the National Museum of Natural History (USNM 248510).
> Bailey (1936:393) considered the species "well established
> and thriving" in that area. However, the population in
> Umatilla Co. apparently was extirpated sometime during the
> 1930s (Kebbe, 1955b).
>
> Populations of D. virginiana were established in northwestern
> Oregon apparently from releases of animals brought to the
> state as pets or novelties (Kebbe, 1955b; Oregon State Game
> Commission,1946b). By 1946, the species was established along
> the lower Columbia, Nehalem, and Young's rivers (Oregon State
> Game Commission, 1946b). Although a Virginia opossum from an
> unexplained source was killed near Salem (Marion Co.) in 1948,
> Clatsop Co. and nearby regions in adjoining counties were
> considered the "only area in the state now known to have opossums"
> (Kebbe,1955b:42). Hammer (1966:8) reported the species south to
> the Benton-Lane county line in 1965 and east to "nine miles east
> of Scio, Linn County, in 1963." Populations now are established
> throughout the Willamette Valley and otber interior valleys,
> and along the entire Pacific Coast. E. W. Hammer (pers.
> comm., 24 March 1968) reported examining a specimen killed on
> U. S. Route 26 in Wasco Co. about 21 km nor~ of the Wasco-
> Jefferson county line. Also, since the claimed extirpation of
> the population in Umatilla Co., numerous additional opossums
> from east of the Cascade Range were reported taken for fur.
>
>
> --
> Mike Patterson
> Astoria, OR
> celata at pacifier.com
>
> Gull, you really got me going
> http://www.surfbirds.com/blogs/mbalame/archives/2008/01/gull20080105.html
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