Real estate agent Kim Doggett recently got an unexpected guest: a hungry opossum who ate the entire Costco Tuxedo Cake she had bought to share with her family. Earlier that evening, Doggett asked her son to take her homemade peanut butter balls outside to the patio, as their refrigerator was full. Upon opening the door, her son quickly shut it and refused to go back out. “There’s a possum on the couch,” said 22-year-old Hyden Doggett. There on the couch was a panting possum who had left brown paw prints all over the furniture. The mother and son tried to shoo the possum away, with no luck. That’s when Kim wondered whether the chocolate could be poisonous to the animal. She called the Humane society, and they retrieved and transported the animal to the Nebraska Wildlife Rehab to be evaluated. The “Cake Bandit” — as the Humane Society dubbed the possum — was treated for an unrelated lead toxicity. Laura Stastny, the group’s executive director, said eating the entire chocolate cake likely saved the possum’s life. “It appears that she was lucky to have been caught red-handed, because it allowed her to come to our hospital and get diagnosed with what can become a fatal condition in wildlife.” Kim quickly posted a photo on social media, which prompted Nebraska Wildlife Rehab to be flooded with calls in support of the “Cake Bandit.” Since the possum’s admittance to the center, the organization has designed t-shirts with “Cake Bandit” on the front, and the back displaying the animal’s rehab admission note: “Opossum was brought in due to having eaten an entire Costco chocolate cake. It was panting a lot, however mobile and alert.” The opossum is expected to make a full recovery and will be returned to her natural habitat in the new few weeks.
