Wednesday 7 May 2008

Cane Toads Advance



Bugger.............just like the old Toyota ads. The dreaded cane toad pest is now in our street, even in our yard!

It is the middle of the night - noisy dog - and the male of the house does his duty and heads off for an investigation. And discovers that the dog had knocked over a package in the back yard, near the gate. But the dog is agitated..........and eyeing the front yard.

Bloody hell..........a LARGE cane toad in the driveway.

WACK WACK........and a large shovel does the job and the cane toad is despatched to the mulch bin. [They make excellent compost and fertiliser]. But in the meantime, the neighbour has arrived at her front gate alarmed by the commotion; assuaged by my glib words "got a bloody cane toad" . Peace returns!

A foretaste of more to come?

The map shows distribution in 2004.......and it is definitely moving west, across the Top End of Australia.

It is now nearly a month since any rain in Darwin and the blighters are on the move for water. Further up the rise, in an adjacent street, several were found in a swimming pool last week. And a big toad bust [http://www.toadbusters.org/] held last week at the Jingili Water Gardens captured quite a few cane toads.

Yet, as a regular late evening dog walker I have not seen them along the creek path where I usually run and walk with the mighty Ridgeback.

Bugger!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

When I was visiting Queensland the cane toads would congregate in the drip of the outdoor shower . . . good way to attract them. I guess any low walled dish with water would too.

Loved the tree frogs in the toilets too. But the rats in the house made me move out (we were living by the cane fields)