The Hideous Giant Toad of Oz

[Story]

Like some ancient nightmare from a Lovecraft novel, worshipped by South Sea Islanders. Ia! Ia! ... you folks know the rest, feel free to chant along.

Hunters trap giant cane toad
March 28, 2007 12:00am
Article from: Herald-Sun
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,21458799-662,00.html

A CANE toad the size of a small dog has been nabbed in the middle of a "breeding frenzy" in Darwin.
The 861-gram male is the biggest caught anywhere in the Northern Territory, according to environmental group Frogwatch.

Measuring 20.5cm in length, the colossal male was one of 39 toads caught in a breeding frenzy, said FrogWatch co-ordinator Graeme Sawyer.

"The biggest toads are usually females but this one was a rampant male," he said.

"He is huge. I would hate to meet his big sister."

 

[moustache]

Awwwww.What a cutie

Quite a handsome fella if you ask me.

JD

 

[Fletch]

Let's name him Winston.

 

[Feraud]

lol too funny!

 

[HadleyH]

OMG what a freak of a toad
I read about this in today's papers, they say it was introduced into northen Australia in the 1930s and they say the toads are getting closer and closer to Sydney, they call them "superb invaders"

 

[Mojito]

In general, I like frogs and toads. My sister has a herpatologists' license, and keeps lovely green tree frogs from Queensland that have come down south in banana shipments and need a home. They're a joy to 'frog sit'.

Cane toads are something else. Introduced, as Hadley mentions, to control a beetle that was munching its way through the sugar cane crops, they're toxic to most domestic and native animals - although there are promising signs that some of the native wildlife is developing a tolerance for them. Crows are some of the few critters smart enough to deal with them - they flip them over and go for the underbelly, thereby avoiding the oozing poisins the toad excretes.

They're on the march, too (or hop). A biological menance that's expanding its territory. QLDers loathe them with a passion - they'll go out of their way to swerve and hit them on roads and play Cane Toad Golf with their clubs.

Still...it's amazing how even the right hat can render a canie somehow endearing!

 

[pretty faythe]

Wheres Jeff Corwin when you need him, unleashed, of course. Flash back to a Jeff Corwin Unleashed episode where he was holding an enormous frog, and making it talk.
fftopic: Is there any thing he hasn't made talk?? hmmm