You are just drifting off to sleep when you hear a loud screeching and coughing, followed by scratching and banging coming from your roof.
Unfortunately, this is a nightly occurrence for many households across urban Australia. Luckily it doesn’t mean your house is haunted, however, it is a sign that you have some particularly loud and uninvited possum roommates in your roof.
Possum Noises
Possums are one of Australia’s most well-known native animals, but they are also some of the loudest. If there is a group of possums in your area, you will know about it.
The brushtail possum is the most vocal of Australia’s possum species and is easily identifiable by its louder and explosive set of aggressive noises that have been described as a throaty cough like that of a wild pig. Brushtails are more commonly found in urban areas and love to take up residence in roofs, which means if there are loud noises in your ceiling it’s probably a brushtail possum.
The other common species of Australian possum is the ringtail possum, the quieter of the two species. While it still has a distinctive cry to communicate with other possums, it’s vocalisations are much quieter. Its cry is more akin to a chirruping noise than the aggressive grunts of the brushtail possum.
Possums make these noises to communicate with each other and just like humans possums use their vocalisations to communicate a point. For example, when a mother is kicking a teenage possum out of the nest, or if a gentleman possum goes courting a female possum, it can get very loud very fast and can be quite scary for humans who don’t know what’s making the noise.
However, unlike humans, possums go silent when they are hurt or in pain. This is a natural self-preservation reaction to help stop predators from finding them while they are injured and becoming easy prey.
If possum noises are making it hard to sleep, give us a call to evict your unwanted possum tenants, and possum proof your roof to stop them coming back.
