Friday 25 September 2015

14 on the Air, Still looking for a few more toads


Toad 21 being released after getting fitted with his winter transmitter
It has been a busy start for our telemetry study this fall.  In the past 2 weeks we have found 17 toads and fit them all with small temporary transmitters.  Two toads have slipped their belts and were nowhere to be seen when we went to locate them for one of their weekly check-ins.  All we found was the transmitter hiding in some vegetation.  We have also removed one belt from a small male, as we need to try and even out the distribution of our study sample throughout the project area.  We had three toads on one property and we decided to only follow the larger female at this site. Because this female is much larger than some of our males, we have been able to fit her with a 9 month transmitter which will hopefully take us through the winter and well into spring, as long as she does not slip out of her belt too. At present we have 14 toads on the air and we are continuing to search for more adult toads for our hibernation study. Our goal is to have 15 on the air throughout the fall and winter.



We would like to give a shout out to some of our Toadally Awesome volunteers.  

Finding toads for our study is a bit like searching for a needle in a haystack. There are several things that make finding toads a little challenging: they are mostly nocturnal, they prefer to hunker down during the day under vegetation or in other hiding places; they have excellent camouflage and they are relatively small compared to other wildlife.  Last year we found 8 toads by driving along roads on dark, and usually rainy nights.  This year we have been fortunate to have some great volunteers looking for toads on their properties and calling us when they find one.  We have been able to fit these animals with belts and then release them back where we found them.  It will be interesting to see if the toads from peoples' gardens behave any differently from those that we have found associated with road edges.

Special thanks goes out to Darren and Wendy, Rose, Morris and Corrin, Lisa, Arlene, Cherie, Helen, and Susan (don't worry you will find one Susan).

Here are some of our volunteers 
with their toads

Arlene with toad 22, aka "Teddy"
Toad 22 was found on the road in front of Arlene's house on Sept.18th.  He moved to the back of Arlene's property and has spent the past 7 days in an old, decaying stump under a large maple tree.  A perfect place to hide during the day and forage at night.  



Cherie with toad 24, aka Prince Charming

Toad 24 was found by volunteer Cherie, while she was out working in her beautiful garden on Sept. 21st. We fit him with a transmitter that afternoon and released him where he was first seen.  We went back to Cherie's garden on Sept 24th to check on Prince Charming and he hadn't moved far, less than 5 meters from where we released him.

If you see a toad in your yard, please catch it and place it in a large bucket with a tight fitting lid with air holes.  Make sure to have some moist leafy vegetation in the bottom of the bucket.  Call us right away and we will come to see if your toad can be part of our study. We are especially interested in toads from the western side of our study area (see the map below).  


Tuesday 22 September 2015



Join us tonight, September 22 at 7 pm to learn about our study and find how you can get involved.


As of September 21st, we have 13 toads on the air!! 


Toad 10 on September 13th, 2015
We are aiming to follow 15 toads this fall/winter and would really like to try and get two more adult toads from the western region of our study area. If you live near Stotlz Campground or spend time on trails in that area, we would love to have your help finding toads for our study.  Please join us tonight for our talk to learn more about how to handle toads and what to do if you find one.  Or send us an email and we will contact you.


Thursday 10 September 2015

Telemetry is Under Way!!


Thanks to some amazing volunteers we have two toads officially "on the air" as of Tuesday September 8th.  Darrren and Wendy found two male adult toads while working in their garden and called us to come and fit them with transmitters for this fall.  We will be heading out later today to track where they have moved to over the past 40 hours or so.  

Toads 9 and 10 fitted with transmitters and ready for release.

Two more toads found!!

Another rock star volunteer, Rose, found two more toads last night on her way home from the fire hall.  We will be fitting toads 11 and 12 later today and releasing them where Rose found them.  

Toad 11

Follow that toad.....

We would love help finding toads this fall.  If you are the kind of person that does not mind going for a walk at dusk or in the dark, we would love to meet you at our public meeting on Sept. 22nd at the Sahtlam Fire Hall at 7 pm.  We will give more details on what to do if you find a toad and where to look. Hope to see you there.