Toad the Size of a Small Dog Captured
DARWIN, Australia (March 27) - A "monster" cane toad the size of a small dog has been captured by an environmental group dedicated to wiping out the toxic amphibian, which has killed countless animals since being introduced to Australia in the 1930s.
The volunteer-run organization, Frogwatch, picked up the 15-inch-long cane toad during a raid on a pond outside the northern city of Darwin late Monday. With a body the size of a football and weighing nearly 2 pounds, the "monster toad" is among the largest specimens ever captured in Australia, according to Frogwatch coordinator Graeme Sawyer. "It's huge, to put it mildly," he said. "The biggest toads are usually females but this one was a rampant male ... I would hate to meet his big sister."
Cane toads were imported from South America during the 1930s in a failed attempt to control beetles on Australia's northern sugar cane plantations. The poisonous toads have proven fatal to Australia's delicate ecosystems, killing millions of native animals from snakes to the small crocodiles that eat them.
As part of its so-called "Toad Buster" project, Frogwatch conducts regular raids on local water holes, blinding the toads with bright lights then scooping them up by the dozen.
"We kill them with carbon dioxide gas, stockpile them in a big freezer and then put them through a liquid fertilizer process" that renders the toads nontoxic, Sawyer said. "It turns out to be sensational fertilizer," he added.
"We kill them with carbon dioxide gas, stockpile them in a big freezer and then put them through a liquid fertilizer process" that renders the toads nontoxic, Sawyer said. "It turns out to be sensational fertilizer," he added.
I'm pretty sure I've never shared this information with you, faithful readers, but I am scared to death of frogs. If there were a Top Ten Things Puddin Is Afraid Of list, frogs would be at the #1 spot. The odd thing is that I don't really have a reason why I'm afraid of frogs. As far as I can tell, I never had a frightening frog experience as a small child, nor as an adult for that matter; I'm just afraid of frogs. So I cannot begin to put into words how I would feel if I came across a frog the size of a friggin' football; my first reaction would be to reach for my Smith & Wesson and shoot it.
2 comments:
it's the size of a freakin' football!!! holy crap! im not afraid of frogs but i think i would be afraid of that one!
I do know how you hate frogs and toads Puddin, and I'm sorry to say that with the onset of Spring all the toads around my house have made a return...
On a different note, this story is another reason animals should not be introduced to countries where they do not belong. Remember when all the little ladybug looking beetles were brought here to control some type of pests? My house has been infested with them ever since. Don't mess with Mother Nature. She put certain critters in certain places for a reason. It's not our place to mess up that balance.
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