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Spadefoot Toad — printable fact sheet
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Spadefoot Toad
Spea bombifrons
Spadefoot toads (families Scaphiopodidae and Pelobatidae) are burrowers built around one tool: a hard, keratinised, sharp-edged tubercle on each hind foot, the "spade", with which the animal digs backwards, sinking into the soil with an alternating shuffle. In arid country a spa…
Did you know?
- Unlike most toads, Spadefoot Toads have smooth, moist skin and vertical pupils, traits more commonly associated with frogs.
- Spadefoot tadpoles can complete metamorphosis in about eight days, among the fastest of any frog, because their pool is evaporating beneath them. Whether a Spea tadpole becomes a placid algae-eater or a cannibalistic carnivore with an oversized head is decided by what it eats in its first days. Adults can spend most of the year underground in a cocoon of their own shed skin. The trigger for emergence appears to be the vibration of heavy rain hitting the ground, which the buried animal can feel a metre down.
What I learned
Draw the spadefoot toad
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