Oz vigilantes capture Toadzilla

Poisonous amphibian the 'size of a football'

By Lester Haines • Get more from this author

Posted in Biology, 27th March 2007 11:42 GMT

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Australian environmental group Frogwatch has captured one of the largest cane toads ever seen Down Under - a 40cm long, 1kg monster boasting a body "the size of a football".

Frogwatch operatives snared the beast yesterday during a "Toad Buster" raid on a pond outside Darwin, The Independent reports.

The voluntary organisation is dedicated to combating the cane toad menace which, since the animals' injudicious introduction into Oz in the 1930s has seen indigenous wildlife massacred by the seemingly unstoppable killer amphibian.

Regarding the heavyweight capture, Frogwatch coordinator Graeme Sawyer said: "It's huge, to put it mildly. The biggest toads are usually females but this one was a rampant male...I would hate to meet his big sister."

Impressive as his dimensions are, there will be no mercy shown to Toadzilla. Sawyer explained: "We kill [the toads] with carbon dioxide gas, stockpile them in a big freezer and then put them through a liquid fertiliser process. It turns out to be sensational fertiliser."

The Independent has an impressive snap of Toadzilla here. ®

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