Last month Bill from
Bill's Ponderings who lives in Brisbane posted on yet another case of fried possum and an electricity outage as a result. Apparently the possums climb up the power poles onto the lines and short them. They will do that with monotonous regularity if they are not prevented. In New Zealand when I first came I couldn't understand why every - and I mean
every - pole had an aluminium or alloy sleeve. It is to make it impossible for possums to climb them. It's such a simple thing but 100% effective.
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| A band of possum preventers. A band. Gedit? |
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| Simple but effective |
Posts
Is it always though?
ReplyDeleteI can remember the first year I was here ( I live near Wellington, and have been here for 11 years) I read a story about a large grass/bush fire down in McKenzie country. The cause was put down to exploding bits of flaming possum being scattered from a HV cable.
TSB I'm not sure that ever looked down in the South Island and perhaps because they spread down there after their colonisation of the North Island there are some areas without them but I imagine that will soon be remedied if it hasn't been already. But they certainly seem to be on every pole in the North Island.
Delete'Exploding bits of flaming possum' doesn't sound very wildlife friendly. Never mind about the fires and outages what about the flaming possums?
Deletewel mooi dat z,on eenvoudige oplossing een groot probleem kan voorkomen.
ReplyDeleteSoms, Bas, eenvoudig is het beste.
DeleteWhen I lived in Brisbane we had a possum fry itself outside our place ~ it took out the grid for suburbs around us. I had never realised how noisy a city can be, even in the middle of the night, until there was no electricity.
ReplyDeleteCarol we had an electricity outage here a few weeks ago: almost the whole of Hawkes Bay. Lightning struck a major distribution transformer. Even the radio station was off air for a short time. All of a sudden everone was paralysed. The shops shut because no lights and no tills. People headed to the cafes but they were in the same situation.
DeleteWhat is fried possum like? Can you eat it in place of say a steak or a pork chop? And another question I would like to ask is who invented the anti-possum sleeve? He (or she!) was certainly thinking outside the box - perhaps one of those boxes in your first picture!
ReplyDeleteMight it be like squirrel? People eat squirrels.
DeleteHaven't you got that the wrong way round Frances? Squirrels eat people - especially those of us who are nuts!
DeleteGroan...
DeleteApparently possum tastes more like pork than any other meat (which I find very surprising indeed and I'm not sure I believe it). However I did see this post which is actually very interesting because it explains the recipe and her neighbours' reaction to the idea of possum. I don't think I could eat it but then I'm not good when it comes to the idea of eating any living creature.
DeleteBut GB -- once the possum has electocuted itself, it's no longer living anyway! I've never eaten possum but the folks from the Deep South say it's actually quite tasty. (I'll take their word for it!)
DeleteWhy do those silly possums climb the poles in the first place?
ReplyDeleteBecause they're there. Isn't that always why people climb things?
DeleteMeike possums sleep during the day in all sorts of nooks and crannies up the top of trees or in people's attics or up any convenient pole (if they could). I expect sitting next to a nice warm transformer would be possum heaven. As it is if they manage to get up there and touch the wires they just go to heaven anyway.
DeleteWhat an exciting country. Fried possum, exploding Possum. No wonder they invented the sleeve. One can't have too much of a good thing.
ReplyDeleteYup. Im- possumble to have too much of a good thing, Adrian. You should know that. (This possum thing is taking up too much of my time. I'm going to bed before GB gets back.)
DeleteThere's nothing like possums for starting a discussion. I'm sad that you wanted to avoid me Frances. I shall retire hurt.
DeleteI'm not avoiding you, GB. Perish the thought. I just thought I might have exhausted all the possumbilities open to me. I don't even know what a possum is...
DeleteFrances this is a possum that I blogged about. I'm sure you'll thing she is cute.
DeleteMakes good sense to me.
ReplyDeleteYes Red. Very good sense.
DeleteWe have the same problem here with squirrels. One of the joys of having all your power lines above ground ... regular outages. A lot of the time we can hear the transformers blow, and even if it's daylight, we know it's time to get out the candles.
ReplyDeleteCarol fortunately outages here in NZ are rare in my experience and the days on Lewis of frequent outages are long gone too.
DeleteI once mentioned to a niece in England that the power had blown. Her question: "But why would the power go out?" One of the perks of living in a civilized country! xoxox
DeleteBack in 2006, we did have a monkey cause an island-wide power cut when he climbed up a pole and was electrocuted....poor thing.
ReplyDeleteBet he wasn't a popular monkey Virginia. I haven't heard much about your 'favourite' monkey recently either.
DeleteGraham, I've just discovered I follow Bill's wife's blog. The blogging world is shrinking thanks to possomsThe Angry Smile: The Psychology of Passive Aggressive Behavior in Families, Schools, and Workplaces, 2nd edition
ReplyDeleteThe Angry Smile: The Psychology of Passive Aggressive Behavior in Families, Schools, and Workplaces, 2nd edition
What the ??? Where did the rest of my comment come from??
ReplyDeletePerhaps you were having an angry smile as you wrote it...
DeleteI don't know Pauline but it's rather funny as is the coincidence with you knowing Bill's wife.
DeleteClever!
ReplyDeleteYes Monica. Simple and clever.
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