Australian toad-busters hunt Cane Toads
An article from The Daily Telegraph showing the effects of introducing alien species
Nick Squires
A new recruit to a growing army of volunteers, Marilyn Bartels shines her torch into the dripping mangrove swamp in search of her prey.
"I find them repulsive. I caught three on my first outing," she says, probing the darkness for Australia's most reviled alien invader - the cane toad.
Just over seventy years after being introduced from Hawaii to Queensland in a failed attempt to wipe out sugar cane beetles, the toads have finally reached Darwin, the capital of the Northern Territory.
Bartels, a 57-year-old accountant, is one of 30 volunteers to gather in cloying humidity for the latest cane toad 'muster' on the outskirts of the city, in which as many toads as possible are caught and killed.
It is estimated that more than 100 million bufo marinus have hopped and croaked their way across the tropical north of the continent, but Australians are now fighting back.
"We won't be able to wipe them out, but by killing as many as we can, we can minimise their impact," says Graeme Sawyer, the co-ordinator of the city's toad-busting efforts. "If you just let them breed, there would be absolute devastation."
The volunteers, equipped with powerful torches and clear plastic sacks, fan out into the darkness. Almost immediately two of the enemy are spotted, scooped up and bagged.
The toads are despised not just for their warty skin and gargantuan size - large adults resemble and are the size of half-deflated footballs - poison glands on their backs make them deadly to the crocodiles, lizards, snakes and birds which attempt to eat them. The result is devastating to indigenous wildlife.
The ever-resourceful Aussies have found uses for their toad haul. The carcasses are brewed with liquid molasses and fish emulsifier to form a foul-smelling brown "toad juice", which has proved to be a highly effective fertiliser.
The first batch will go on sale this week in Darwin for about £5 a bottle. Preliminary results have shown it is especially good for growing bananas and papayas.
And Paul Cowdy, from the conservation group Frogwatch, reckons he has found another profitable use for the toads.
"I've started skinning them for their leather," says Mr Cowdy, originally from Salisbury, Wilts. "It's hard-wearing and attractive - you can make purses, wallets, mobile phone covers."
In addition to the weekly toad musters, Darwin locals round up toads in their gardens and kill them, often with the aid of a golf club or cricket bat.
The squeamish can place their captured toads in one of four toad "detention centres" -large boxes equipped with food and water to keep the toads alive until they can be humanely slaughtered.
While Darwin is besieged by a massed amphibian assault, millions of other toads are converging on Western Australia, hundreds of miles away.
A heroic effort has been launched to keep the toads out of the state, but locals acknowledge they are fighting a losing battle. The toads have a rampant libido and a female can lay up to 35,000 eggs at a time.
The toad-busters of Western Australia and the Northern Territory acknowledge that the best they can do is stem the onslaught while waiting for scientists to come up with a silver bullet capable of drastically reducing numbers - most likely a cane toad-specific virus.
Tuesday 13th March 2007
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