Community News

Two x 3 year old females were among the toad parentals gathered at Woombah last Friday. (Photo – Sharon Davidge)

Cane toads going ‘viral’ and captured by the thousands

It’s been a big week for the efforts of controlling cane toads and spreading awareness of this maligned pest for Landcarers in the Clarence Valley with very impressive statistics in the thousands being a common thread.

The thread started a little over a week ago at James Creek when a single batch of 10,700 cane toad eggs that appear like dotty jelly in long shoe lace-like strands (see photo) were extracted from a private farm dam by Clarence Landcare cane toaders.

Finding toad eggs is a very welcome, though not common, occurrence as the toad tadpoles or ‘toadpoles’ typically hatch within three days or so being able to remove this batching eggs from the water before they hatched was something worth promoting.

When news of the find was published by CVCIA Landcare on their Facebook page in an attempt to improve public awareness and encourage people to find and remove toad eggs things soon went viral and now one of the photos showing the toad eggs has been shared on the social media platform a whopping 8,000 times and counting and along with the extra exposure the Groups Facebook following has spiked.

Riding the wave of peaking numbers CVCIA Landcare took their Friday night toading exploits to the Woombah community last week and with the guiding of some keen local residents were able to check new sites on private property with yet another private dam yielding big numbers of toads, including a Friday night toading record of 3550 newly emerged metamorphs (very small/baby toads) along with a few dozen toady parentals that were loitering nearby.

Efforts on the night were never going to be enough to arrest this new generation of cane toads and so two days later Clarence Landcare toaders went back again to remove those that resisted arrest on the Friday night and as a result a further 1730 metamorphs and 2750 small toad tadpoles were removed from the very same dam.

After a quiet start to the current toading season due to record dry conditions these recent breeding events show that cane toads are not going away any time soon and so the efforts of Clarence Landcare and CVCIA Landcare toaders, landowners and communities like Woombah to assist in tackling cane toads is even more necessary and valuable.

Friday night cane toading will move back to the Yamba Golf Course this week where early-season breeding has already occurred and those keen to get out on the fairways for some nocturnal cane toad control are invited to meet in the southern car park near the Yamba Museum at 7.45pm with your sturdy shoes, bright headlamp or torch and sense of adventure at the ready with enquiries to Scott on 0477 616 210.

Scott Lenton 

Strands of cane toad eggs found at James Creek displayed by Chelsie Young (Photo – Scott Lenton).
CVCIA Landcare volunteers recording the results last Friday night (Photo – Sharon Davidge)
A selection of the metamorphs caught at Woombah last Friday night. (Photo – Sharon Davidge)