| Common toad - Bufo bufo - Family: Bufonidae
 Common toad - Bufo bufo© Dr Chris Gibson/English NatureUnlike frogs, toads have dry warty skin, with larger glandular warts just behind the eye, and are flatter in shape. The iris is copper coloured. Toads are usually dark green or brown. They live mostly out of water, which they need only for breeding. They spend the greater part of the year in damp, shady places such as under stones, logs and sheds. Common toads are very useful pest killers and eat a range of creatures including slugs. However, an evening expedition into the garden with a torch will sometimes reveal a toad watching complacently as an enormous slug consumes your favourite dahlia, so they cannot be wholly relied upon! Their first line of defence is to urinate when captured! A second deterrent to predators is an extremely bad tasting skin. Toads return to the water to breed in early spring, laying spawn in narrow strings wrapped around submerged plants rather than in clumps, like frogs. Even toad tadpoles have distasteful skin and fish usually spit them out. They are eaten by great crested newts, however, as well as by insects such as great diving beetles and dragonfly larvae. Toad tadpoles are more difficult to establish in garden ponds than frogs and seem to thrive best in fish ponds, especially if the water weed which would otherwise support a high density of predatory insects is removed in the autumn. The tadpoles are smaller and darker than frog tadpoles, and have a maximum length of between 3 and 5 cm. They often swim in conspicuous shoals. After breeding, toads may move as far as an astonishing 1. 6 kilometres from their breeding ponds, so you may find toads in your garden even if they do not breed in the vicinity. The smaller males mature earlier than females, often at two years old, and usually out-number females. Breeding females may be surrounded by large balls of fighting males. Although many toads die after their first breeding season, animals as old as nine years old have been found in the wild. FoodAdults: insects, worms and slugs. PreyCommon earthworm, Common green grasshopper, Culiseta annulata, Fast woodlouse, Flat-backed millipede, Non-biting midge, Oniscus asellus, Pill millipede, Pink woodlouse, Porcellio scaber, Slow-worm, Slugs and snails, Water invertebrates PredatorsBuzzard, Grass snake, Great crested newt, Great diving beetle, Kestrel |
