During a recent drive from work to his Melbourne, Australia home, a man named Nipuna Wanigasinghe spotted something unusual on the side of the road. A strange-looking animal was standing on the sidewalk, watching the cars pass by.
Wanigasinghe decided to stop his car to take a closer look and was surprised by what he saw. The animal looked like a young brushtail possum, a common sight in the area, but its golden fur was unlike anything he had seen before.
After snapping some photos and videos, Wanigasinghe decided to get the animal out of harm’s way. He took off his sweater, wrapped it up around the golden furry ball, and then took it to a tree that was further off the road.
Wanigasinghe later shared the footage from the encounter on Facebook page Field Naturalists Club of Victoria while also contacting animal wildlife organization Wildlife Victoria to learn more about the unusual animal.
It turned out that the animal was indeed a brushtail possum. In a response to Wanigasinghe’s inquiry, Wildlife Victoria staffer said that this particular subset of a brushtail possum has a golden fur due to a genetic mutation. They also added that they are quite rare in the wild and that Wanigasinghe was lucky to spot one.
