Rescuer Uses Car Heater to Warm Up Abandoned Baby Possum on Kangaroo Island

A farmer whose home was destroyed by the https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-51102658 bushfires on Kangaroo Island said he found an abandoned baby possum beneath a tree and used his car heater to warm the animal up. Isaac Martlew of https://www.instagram.com/stornoway_fires/ stornoway_fires posted a video to his Instagram account showing the animal, which appears to be a https://animaldiversity.org/accounts/Pseudocheirus_peregrinus/ ringtail possum , curled up in the palm of his hand as he holds the tiny creature in front of a car vent. The footage shows the joey gently wiggling around in Martlew's hand. Martlew told Storyful that he initially found the animal "under a tree stiff as a board, cold as ice." "I checked him out and he had no wounds and he seemed to be healthy, so I pumped on his chest a few times and blew on his mouth a little," he told Storyful. The tiny possum then moved its foot and tail, Martlew said. Martlew then "took him straight to the car to warm up in front of the heater," he told Storyful. According to https://animaldiversity.org/accounts/Pseudocheirus_peregrinus/ reports , ringtail possums typically travel in small groups, which led Martlew to believe the joey had been abandoned by its mother. Martlew noted in the caption of his original upload that he believed the "poor fella lost his grip while holding onto his mum at some point during the night." (Footage By stornoway_fires/Storyful via Getty Images)