What to feed them?

I believe the best milks are made by "Womaroo".

For the caring public:
Just don't bother about milk at all. You should pass the animal on to someone who knows the ropes. There will be only one feeding issue that will be critical right from the start and that is thirst. I dehydration will start to become serious within hours. Just keep a packet of powder to make up some fluid that you can give to all animals. Vets sell "oral rehydration therapies" called Lectade or Vitrate. If you really feel you should think about providing milk then get Womaroo "First Aid" milk till you can pass the animal on to a carer.

For carers:
Wombaroo seem to have gone into the wildlife food business in big way. See your vet or an experienced wildlife carer (NOT an inexperienced one). There seem to be all these people out there that reccommend cheaper milk substitues that I understand are lactose free stuff. I guess this is OK for emergency sustenance, but I have no reason to believe it is any better than that. I haven't seen any idication that it is genuinely made to support wildlife. Vet's have said to me that it's the same as lactose free baby milk and packaged for people who want to feed it to animals.

When to feed:

Well, this firstly a matter of finding out a schedule, usually about 10% of their body weight each day, then there comes the matter of handling the exceptions to that. Tiny animals need frequent feeds, 4 hourly, including through the night, and larger ones can be fed twice or three times a day even though they are still supposed to spend most of their time in the pouch. Deciding which stage of their development they are at now is another topic, but for now we'll think about variations from the basic schedule that you have somehow decided on.

The most demanding situation is when the animal still has it's eyes permanently closed. This stage is a bit extreme. The animal can still survive with enough intensive care, but it's all too rare. It may be better to think practically. Think of the never ending stress the little animal will have to endure. The many subtle forms of stress that result from a disasterous disruption to it's life supporting conditions. The smaller they are the more critical it is that everything is just right for them. Any alteration to anything in the life support system can lead to a fatal illness. It may be better for both of you to just leave the animal at the accident site or take it to a vet for euthanasia.

Later in life the feed schedule becomes less critical. Indeed they may sometimes not need food at their feeding time, or they may be more hungry than usuall. You may be able to delay feeding till it's more convenient for you. They sometimes wake up for some reason other than food. They often consume more or less, or refuse food even when they need it.

Deducing their needs becomes more dependant on our experience - just getting used to their ways - but mostly on our inquisitive mind. Questioning ourselves instead of thinking of explaning away their behaviour. I'm thinking of too many times when I concluded that a little animal just decided to come out of it's bedding to have some activity. Looking at myself I imagine that jumping to conclusions tends to be a human desire - watchout for that.

A trap that the uninitiated people fall for is:
"Oh, the little thing has woken up for a play".
And sooner or later the animal dies. Then we get another animal and some time later that dies too. And we still don't see the connection. This is the scenario of marsupials falling into the wrong hands. This leads to another of our natural human reactions, the temptation to ignore or possibly defend our mistakes, making us a downright danger to wildlife.

Another job for carers is to watch out for such people and just try to get the animal from them. But back to the original track:

Clues:

I see their gadding about as a desperate move in the hope that something will happen to restore normality - maybe an instinctive reaction that attracts the attention of the mother. But you can be sure something is wrong and usually it is hunger.

Don't feed a cold little animal. I'm not sure why but I don't care. They are supposed to be in a warm pouch with food on tap. An abnormal situation brings in difficulties and repercussions.

Their guts are sensitive.
They are actually delicate when young. I would expect inadequate diet to be the most common cause of death of animals in care and it's a constant threat hanging over you both when the animal is small, especially if it's furless.

When they are small, don't take their refusal to feed. Food is critical and you must persist. Possums are little buggers for this. They clench their jaws shut and won't let anything in. I never need to pry mouths open. If I dribble milk on their lips then reflexes take over and they lick it up. This may give you a chance to slip the teet in. If not then keep doing it. I often don't even bother getting the teet properly in their mouths but just keep dribbling the milk onto the lips just below their nose and they lick it up obsessively, till there's no milk left.

Another common trait is for animals to not want milk untill they are drinking it, then they want it.

The more they grow then the more I let them decide when and how much food to offer them. How do you know if they can decide? I watch for signs of sensibility. If they crawl off something and drop to the floor then I think they haven't much sense and I stick to the feeding schedule.