Toad ball

France, British isles

Toad ball

Postby Paul Lambourne » Sun Mar 04, 2012 10:44 pm

Friday evening I was out walking the dog in the woods behind my house and the staffy started going mental at something on the path, it was pitch black so I used the light on my phone to see what was going on.. I was greeted by the fabulous sight of a toad ball, I have not seen one for years, and never on land.. there were actually four toads involved and one sat on the side lines watching..
Sorry about the shite pic, taken by i phone in pitch black..
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Flash, my Staffordshire bull Terrier.. the snow was a few weeks ago..
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There is a small pond a few hundred meteres from my place so I scooped up the toads and transported them to it.. the small pond, about 5m x2m was alive with toads, and large numbers of Lissotriton vulgaris and helveticus.. swimming unphased between the mating toads..I returned the next night to get some pics,

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Been a mad year, so far, I have seen berus, bufo, Lissotriton, natrix,Pelophylax,zootoca and Triturus... as we are so herp light in the UK not much else to see... :D

Cheers all

Paul
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Re: Toad ball

Postby Jeroen Speybroeck » Sun Mar 04, 2012 11:14 pm

Could you tell us about the vulgaris/helveticus ratios you observe at different sites and possible relation to site characteristics?
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Re: Toad ball

Postby Michal Szkudlarek » Sun Mar 04, 2012 11:36 pm

In my opinion You should not have displaced B. bufo, they are philopatric so there is a possibility that now they have to make bigger distance to their breeding place.
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Re: Toad ball

Postby Kristian Munkholm » Sun Mar 04, 2012 11:38 pm

Nice to see some early amphibian action :)

It's been a mad year here as well. Denmark generally warms up a little later than the UK yet I've already seen natrix, bufo, temporaria, dalmatina, vulgaris and cristatus. Others can add berus and vivipara to the year's list.

I had a similar experience on Wednesday (that's February!) with a pond full calling and amplexing dalmatina with large numbers of vulgaris and smaller numbers of cristatus swimming among them. The first dalmatina eggs were reported from another pond the same day - crazy!



...Oh, and what do you have against Rana temporaria, since you insist on not mentioning them?

Paul Lambourne wrote:...the small pond, about 5m x2m was alive with toads, and large numbers of Lissotriton vulgaris and helveticus...
... Been a mad year, so far, I have seen berus, bufo, Lissotriton, natrix,Pelophylax,zootoca and Triturus...


;)
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Re: Toad ball

Postby Jürgen Gebhart » Mon Mar 05, 2012 6:31 am

Cool!
No activities of Amphibians in my area. :(

cute liitle dog!!
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Re: Toad ball

Postby Pierre-Yves Vaucher » Mon Mar 05, 2012 8:56 am

from 2006 in geneva:

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a female piece of wood :lol: :lol:
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Re: Toad ball

Postby Bobby Bok » Mon Mar 05, 2012 10:33 am

Those are some enormous toad-balls!
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Re: Toad ball

Postby Paul Lambourne » Mon Mar 05, 2012 11:08 am

Pierre,

Incredible picture.. fantastic :D

Kristian,

Nothing against rana, sadly they are not the common amphibian they once were...just that I am old and forgetful :D

Michal

I have been engaged in amphibian conservation for too many years to mention, and I am well aware of toads philopatric habits :D the pond that I moved the toads to is the only pond in the area, and as it was only a few metres from the direction of travel, and was crammed full of breeding toads..I think the risk was justified :D

Jeroen Speybroeck wrote:Could you tell us about the vulgaris/helveticus ratios you observe at different sites and possible relation to site characteristics?


I have not undertaken any detailed study, however my personal observations are thus:

I know of two main ponds locally, one is centred in ancient beech and oak woodland, one (with the toads) is on the periphery of ancient woodland, but actually situated in new woodland, less than a hundred years old.

Both ponds, seem very acidic and have a large amount of leaf debris in them.

Water in both ponds is slightly turbid.

Both ponds have little in the way of aquatic vegetation other than reeds at the borders.

The larger pond, in the ancient woodland measures approx, ten metres x two metres, the smaller pond approx five metres x two metres

The larger pond supports an extremely large and diverse population of aquatic invertebrates, the smaller pond less so.

The larger pond supports no other amphibians other than newts, the smaller pond has a good population of bufo, at breeding time and a small population of rana.

In the larger pond there are good populations of Lissotriton vulgaris, Lissotriton helveticus and,Triturus cristatus. In the smaller pond there are no Triturus cristatus.

I would suggest that in the larger pond has a ratio of approx 10 LV :7 LH :1 TC

The smaller pond approx 10 LV :4 LH :0 TC

As I say this is just my observations, not a long term study.. :D

Cheers Paul
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Re: Toad ball

Postby Jeroen Speybroeck » Mon Mar 05, 2012 11:10 am

Thanks, Paul. I think I'll start a new thread for this.
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Re: Toad ball

Postby Tomas Klacek » Mon Mar 05, 2012 7:51 pm

I know about a local pound which is literally full of toads every spring :) This year, no activity yet :(
Some shots (2009)
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