It’s normal for most animal babies to be found for periods of time without mom, but opossums are one of the few babies that are NEVER found alone. They cannot survive on their own.

When they are born, opossums are embryonic and only the size of a pencil’s eraser. They crawl into the mother’s pouch and remain there for about two months. After leaving the pouch, they hitch a ride on mother’s back, staying with her until six or more inches long without the tail.
Often mother opossums are killed on the road, but the babies remain alive, sometimes uninjured, in the pouch or scattered about on the roadway. Check the pouch in mom’s abdomen for remaining babies. She can have up to thirteen.
Sometimes the baby simply falls off the mother. She may keep going, unknowingly abandoning it.

These are true emergencies because, without its mother, a baby opossum will die.
When hungry, an opossum will make a repeated sneezing type sound. It does not have a cold, it is hungry.

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