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🩺 Your free vet-prep sheet

Your Short-Tailed Opossum Vet-Prep Sheet

Exotic-mammal vets are rare, and it is easy to freeze in a crisis. This is the one page to have ready — how to find a vet, what to bring, what to tell them, and the questions to ask. Print it and keep it with your care notes. This helps you prepare for a vet — it is not treatment.

Black & white saves ink and prints cleanly on any printer.

Not sure it’s a vet trip yet? Run the “normal, or should I worry?” check first — many worries turn out to be a husbandry fix.

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Short-Tailed Opossum — Vet-Prep Sheet

🔍 Find an exotic-mammal vet — before you need one

  • Search the AEMV find-a-vet directory (the Association of Exotic Mammal Veterinarians), or, in the UK, the RCVS Find-a-Vet tool — or search “exotic / small-mammal vet near me”.
  • Call ahead and ask the key question: “Do you see small / exotic mammals?” Not every vet does. Ask the exam fee while you’re on the phone, so the cost is one less panic in a crisis.
  • Find and save one now, while things are calm — not in the middle of an emergency.

📇 Fill this in now — before the crisis

Two minutes now saves ten in a panic. Print it and keep it with your care notes.

My vet
My short-tailed opossum
What I’m seeing

🚨 Is this an emergency now?

See a vet promptly if you notice any of these:

  • Weakness, tremors, bendy limbs or fractures — possible metabolic bone disease from an unbalanced diet; see an exotic vet
  • Not eating, weight loss or lethargy
  • Any skin lesion or growth (they’re prone to UV-related skin tumours) — avoid strong UV and get changes checked
  • Wounds (usually from wrongly housing two together)
  • Diarrhoea or signs of parasites

When in doubt, a vet call is never wrong — most issues are reversible if caught early.

🚗 On the way / while you wait

✅ Do

  • Keep it warm — small mammals chill and dehydrate fast, and cold makes almost everything worse.
  • Bring it in its own bedding/carrier with some familiar food.
  • For rabbits and guinea pigs, keep offering their normal hay, greens and water — a gut that stops is an emergency.
  • Bring a fresh dropping or urine sample if you can.
  • Keep it calm and quiet.

⛔ Don’t

  • Don’t give any human or OTC medicines — some common antibiotics are fatal to rabbits and guinea pigs.
  • Don’t withhold food from a rabbit or guinea pig.
  • Don’t let it get cold.
  • Don’t handle it more than necessary.

🎒 What to bring

  • A fresh dropping or urine sample, if you can collect one.
  • Photos and a short video of the behaviour or symptom — it may not show it in the clinic.
  • A note of your setup and exactly what — and how often — you feed.
  • A note of eating, drinking and toileting over the last day.
  • The animal in a secure, warm carrier.

🗣️ What to tell the vet

A general vet may not know this species. Come ready to explain its correct care:

Enclosure
A secure, escape-proof enclosure — a glass tank with a locking, fine-mesh lid suits them. Their tail is semi-prehensile and they use low vegetation, so give climbing branches and a hide/nest box. (Published husbandry keeps single adults in rat- or guinea-pig-sized caging; breeding needs more floor space.) Keep it genuinely escape-proof.
Companionship
Strictly SOLITARY — must live alone except for supervised, deliberate breeding. Housed together they’re aggressive and wound one another (even during the breeding “dance”), and adults are aggressive toward offspring. This is a hard rule, not a preference.
Temperature
Warmth-dependent — keep the room about 23.5–26.5°C (roughly 74–80°F). (Their normal body temperature is lower than a placental mammal’s, around 32–33°C.) Keep them stably warm.
Substrate
A safe, absorbent bedding (aspen is used in published husbandry) with nesting material — they build nests for warmth. Provide a hide or nest box.
Enrichment
A nest box and nesting material are essential (nest-building is natural). Climbing branches suit their semi-prehensile tail and low-vegetation habits. They’re nocturnal, so expect night-time activity; give them things to explore.
Diet
An insect/animal-protein-based diet is the foundation — in the wild they eat insects, small animals and some fruit. In captivity they’re maintained on insect- and meat-based diets (research colonies use a complete pelleted insectivore/“fox” food, with vitamin supplementation), plus a little appropriate fruit. Feed the diet type, not a random mix, and always provide fresh water.
Supplements
Calcium balance matters: an insect/meat diet that’s poorly balanced (too much phosphorus, or fruit-heavy) risks metabolic bone disease, as in other insectivorous exotics — gut-load or dust feeder insects and follow an exotic vet’s guidance on calcium and vitamins (research diets include vitamin supplementation). Don’t over-supplement calcium either; let a vet set the plan.

⚕️ Small mammals are prey animals and hide illness until it is advanced, so any change in eating, droppings, drinking or behaviour is urgent — in rabbits and guinea pigs, not eating or passing no droppings for 12–24 hours can be a life-threatening emergency (gut stasis). They also chill and dehydrate quickly, so keep it warm. Tell the vet about your diet and any remedies you’ve used, and ask for exotic-mammal-safe medicines and doses — several antibiotics that are routine in other pets are dangerous to rabbits and guinea pigs.

Then note which of the warning signs (above) you are seeing, when they started, and whether they are getting worse.

❓ Questions to ask

  • Do you routinely see small / exotic mammals? If not, can you refer me to a vet who does?
  • What are the likely causes — and could my setup or diet be contributing?
  • What is the treatment plan, the likely cost, and what should I watch for at home?
  • How do I prevent this from happening again?