Animal Clinic Saves Mythical Golden Possum—Viewers Say They Just Caught Pikachu

May 24, 2020 by apost team

In 2018, Boronia Veterinary Clinic and Animal Hospital in Melbourne, Australia rescued a rare golden possum that looks like Pikachu, the Pokémon.

We really shouldn't be that shocked. After all, fact is stranger than fiction, as the saying goes. Plus, fiction is crafted from the images in our minds, which are influenced by the world around us. You can see this in the works of Dr. Seuss, who drew inspiration for his crazy cartoon drawings from the world around him.

So just how does a possum end up looking like a Pikachu? We can explain this due to the wonders of modern science. The golden color is due to a genetic mutation that reduces the amount of melanin they produce. Melanin is the pigment that turns skin or fur brown.

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In humans, it is the pigment involved in having brown skin, whether due to your ethnicity or due to tanning. In possums, it is the pigment responsible for their typically lovely brown coat.

So it's sort of like being an albino, but not quite. Albinos produce no melanin at all. These golden possums produce too little. So maybe it's like being pale-skinned Caucasian. The small amount of melanin they produce leaves them looking golden rather than brown. Unfortunately, this fact makes it hard for them to hide, so they become easy prey for predators out in the wild.

On the upside, this particular possum was rescued and taken to the Boronia Veterinary Clinic. They determined the cute little critter was about five months old and should have still been clinging to mom and probably fell off at some point and got lost.

According to Business Insider, Dr. Stephen Reinisch told The Age that it had been a couple of years since the possum showed up at the clinic, but it was a highly memorable event and he's not surprised it lives on "forever" on the internet.

Reinisch said, "She was brought in by a member of the public who found her on the ground. We suspect she had fallen off her mother’s back." They suspect this is the case due to her apparent age. She really shouldn't have been out on her own yet.

Initially, this Pikachu-looking possum came across as a bit shy, which isn't surprising given that she was a wild animal in a foreign situation, surrounded by humans. Otherwise, she was "...in good spirits and health."

The clinic checked her out and kept her overnight. The following day, she was turned over to a carer to have a semi-permanent home, safe from predators in spite of her brightly colored fur, the opposite of camouflage.

There are actually more golden possums out there than we get told about. Not only are animals a problem, but so is human interest. They are just so darn cute that researchers and others that are in the know don't divulge the known locations of pockets of these little cuties.

According to Caroline Dazey of Wildlife Victoria "...there are little pockets of them in Victoria." They can be found around the fringes of Melbourne, but staff and volunteers won't specify beyond that.

The golden possum is a member of the species trichosurus vulpecula, commonly called the brushtail possum. They are usually brown and can be found across eastern and northern Australia, Tasmania and a few other places.

This may be the cutest thing you will see today. If you know some people who could use some cheer in the form of a real-life Pokemon, pass it along.