Ohio’s 1,857 Virginia opossum records span 86 counties, with Summit, Franklin, and Hamilton at the top. The state sits near the northern edge of the species’ range, yet the opossum is firmly established from the Lake Erie shore to the Ohio River.
A marsupial at the edge of winter
The opossum is North America’s only marsupial, raising its tiny young in a pouch and later carrying them on its back. It is also an unapologetic generalist, a slow, nocturnal omnivore that eats insects, fruit, carrion, eggs, and anything edible around farms and towns, climbing well with its grasping tail. What it cannot do is store much fat or grow a heavy coat, so Ohio winters cost it dearly; frostbitten ears and tail tips are the common badges of a northern opossum. Records gather at Cuyahoga Valley National Park and Wayne National Forest, along the Lake Erie marshes at Killbuck Marsh and Magee Marsh, and inland at Killdeer Plains Wildlife Area.
Most visible when young are riding
Reports run strongest from February through May, when females travel with pouch young and then with youngsters clinging to their backs, and rise again toward November as the year’s broods disperse. Opossums stay active all year, holing up in burrows, hollow logs, and brush piles only during the coldest stretches.
Status in Ohio
NatureServe ranks the Virginia opossum S5, Secure, in Ohio. The species is native to the state, is not listed as nonindigenous by USGS NAS, and holds a global rank of G5, Secure, with an IUCN assessment of Least Concern.
Full species profile
