In Australia, a new family event: toad-hunting

By Jason Szep

BRISBANE (Reuters) - Get the kids. Grab grandma and grandad. The toads are coming.

The croaking, throbbing, ugly, poisonous cane toad continues to slime its way across Australia despite the latest trend to stop the plague: family toad-hunting nights, when mom, dad and the kids gather for some hearty toad busting.

"Bufo marinus", a native of South America shipped to Australia in 1935 to rid cane fields in northern Queensland of the greyback cane beetle, is on a hate list here.

Supported by Brisbane City Council, wildlife groups are spreading the pastime of cane toad busting into Queensland culture as a humane way to destroy the state's number-one warty enemy while spending quality time with the family.

Gone are the days of whacking toads with cricket bats or golf clubs. And no more dipping the toads in an acidic poison or using Bufo marinus as target practice for guns.

Times have changed. People are more in touch with the environment.

Today, cane toads are collected in plastic bags, counted and then frozen. The freezing, scientists say, is painless. The toad simply falls asleep and never wakes.

"We advertise it as 'It's a free activity. It's a family activity. Bring a torch (flashlight) and bring a plastic bag'," said Peter Armstrong, a burly, bearded Australian who runs the Downfall Creek Bushland Centre on the outskirts of Brisbane.

Downfall Creek has been conducting cane toad busting nights for five years and Armstrong says the event is growing in popularity across the state. Queenslanders, he says, are becoming less violent towards toads as a result.

"We don't want anyone to be cruel to animals. It's not the toad's fault that they are here. It's us, Man, that a few years ago made a giant stuff up," he said.

When introduced in the 1930s, the cane toad inspired the wrath of many Australians after it made the mistake of ignoring the destructive cane beetle. Instead, it bred with wild abandon.

The toad has no natural predators in Australia and its venom kills cats, snakes, dogs and other animals which mistake the yellowish brown coat of the cane toad for that of a native amphibian.

Australians are overwhelmed by the toad. The Queensland Museum in Brisbane has declared it a nuisance to humans and an ecological threat to the Australian environment.

Every year, the threat becomes bigger.

The toads are advancing inexorably from Queensland into the Northern Territory and south into New South Wales towards Sydney.

Although the cane toad's northern migration is faster than its southern trek, Sydney residents talk of an eventual cane toad invasion.

Wherever the cane toad goes, natural wildlife suffers, said National Parks and Wildlife Service ranger Rick Nattrass. He said the toads have a voracious appetite for native animals.

"It's fair to say that unless you sustain a strong campaign against the toad, it quickly recovers into its former numbers," Nattrass, a ranger for 11 years, said. "If you slack off for one breeding season, the toad returns to its former glory."

Cane toads live for up to 16 years and females can lay as many as 35,000 eggs a year, compared to native Australian frogs which lay only about 4,000 eggs a year.

Australia has tried various methods to curb the cane toad menace or at least make better use of the species, including an attempt to export them to China for use in medicines. That and other attempts have mostly failed.

During Australia's hotter months, between October and March, the cane toad emerges in droves throughout large swaths of Queensland, ushering in the cane toad busting season. Some zealous busters prowl for the toads wearing cane toad T-shirts.

"While they are introduced animals, cane toad busting has to be done as humanely as possible," said David Morgans, manager at Brisbane Forest Park, which began cane toad busting nights about four years ago.

"It was an attempt to get rid of the toad and it was seen as an activity we could get the whole family involved in," Morgans said. "It's promoted as an opportunity to get out of the house.

"We say 'Don't sit inside watching TV. Come to the park and have a barbecue and capture some cane toads'," Morgans said.

One Brisbane radio station held a contest in March offering a free trip to Hawaii for whoever caught the most cane toads in a week. Contestants rounded up as many as possible, froze them and dropped them off at collection sites around Brisbane.

By the end of the week, a winner had emerged. He had caught and frozen about 1,000 cane toads, according to Armstrong, who helped inspect the catch.