BREEDING HABITS, DEVELOPMENT, AND BIRTH OF 



THE OPOSSUM. 1 



By Carl Hartman, 

 The University of Texas, Austin. 



[With 10 plates.] 



In the popular mind, the generation of no animal is so shrouded 

 in mystery as that of the opossum. Throughout the country, among 

 both whites and negroes, deeply rooted tradition has it that the 

 opossum copulates through the nose and that the female blows the 

 fruit of conception into the pouch. Other myths relating to details 

 of the reproductive process in this species are current among the 

 people. 



The growth of such legends need not surprise one, however, for 

 the early birth of the embryos and the use of the pouch as an in- 

 cubator certainly challenge the imagination. These phenomena at- 

 tract the attention because they are unique, differing from the 

 familiar method of rearing the young obtaining among the higher 

 mammals, including man. Familiarity breeds contempt ; the ordinary 

 ceases to be marvelous. Thus on account of its rareness and its 

 "different" character the opossum, our only marsupial, figures in 

 the folklore to a prominent degree. 



As a matter of fact, however, in extenuation of the popular mis- 

 conception alluded to, it must be said that extremely few scientific 

 observations upon the breeding habits of this animal are recorded. 

 For example, there seem to be only two observations on the mating 

 habits of this species, one by Dr. Middleton Michel (1850), an 

 American physician, and the other by Selenka (1887), the German 

 embryologist. Likewise, the birth of a marsupial, whether American 

 or Australian, was seldom observed; and until the writer in 1919 

 witnessed the actual passage of the young into the pouch the method 

 of transfer remained an enigma even to the professional zoologist. 

 Little published data existed, therefore, to refute myth and legend. 



The present paper is an attempt on the part of the writer to sum- 

 marize some of his observations on the reproduction of the opossum. 



1 Contribution from the Department of Zoology, The University of Texas, No. 154. 



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