- Last 7 days
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there are still mysteries around the cane toads’ cannibalistic tendencies
this might be a tactic to help control the population?
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the toads might have evolved to speed up their hatchling phase,
wow! its crazy that this evolution happened in less than 100 years
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adpoles were nearly 30 times as likely to swim towards a trap containing hatchlings as an empty trap, and the South American tadpoles showed no preference for either.
this is a very big difference
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f the hatchlings that emerge from the tens of thousands of eggs in a single clutch2.
i wonder if this can be used to help bottleneck the population
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introduced about 100 cane toads
it is crazy that this few being introduced can create and epidemic
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that they face more evolutionary pressure from each other, as they compete for resources, than from anything else in Australia.
This is very surprising, it is not evolution pressure from predation
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develop in front of their eyes”, given that the behaviour arose in less than a hundred years — the blink of an eye by evolutionary standards.
this seems like an extremely fast time table
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is far less cannibalistic.
this is very interesting, I wonder if it is based on prey or more environment
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www.dcceew.gov.au www.dcceew.gov.au
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Fine-mesh fencing can also assist in keeping cane toads from ponds that are in need of special protection.
this should definitely be used to protect more sensitive areas
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humanely
MUST be done humanely
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collecting the long jelly-like strings of cane toad eggs from the water
not sure if there is a way to scale this to help the larger problem
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native predator species which are heavily impacted when toads arrive make rapid adaptations (both behavioural and physiological) allowing for population recovery in the longer term.
this means they learn to avoid eating the toad, allowing the toad population to grow further
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other predators are more vulnerable and die rapidly after ingesting toads.
this causes even more damage to the natural food chain
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Females can lay 8000–30 000 eggs at a time. In comparison, most Australian native frogs typically lay 1000–2000 eggs per year.
shocking how quickly they can multiply, especially compared to the natural local species
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If forced to stay in flooded conditions, cane toads can absorb too much water and die. They can also die from water loss during dry conditions.
two other possible solutions
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Toads will even take food left out for pets.
this is very interesting, and maybe something with this could be used to trap them?
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a means of controlling pest beetles in the sugar cane industry in 1935, before the use of agricultural chemicals became widespread.
Why they were introduced
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voracious predators of insects and other small prey
They are known to be very effective predators
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