TOAD, Bufo, a genus of batrachia, of the anaurous or tailless section of the eadueibran chiata. See BATRACTIIA. The original genus has been subdivided, and is now consti tuted into a family, bufonicke, to all which the popular name toad is often extended. The form resembles that of the frogs, but is more thick and clumsy, and the hind-legs are generally short, so that the species rather crawl than leap; some of them, indeed, are not known to leap at all. The skin is warty, and the warts or tubercles produce a. milky exudation, which in some species is very fetid. Behind the ear there is a porous. pad—a very large parotid gland—from which a copious exudation takes place. The muzzle in the restricted genus bufo is rounded, but some of the family have an elongated muzzle. The mouth of the true toads is destitute of teeth. The food of toads consists chiefly of small insects and slugs, and they mostly inhabit shady places, avoiding the sunshine, and crawling about either among the stems and leaves of plants or among i stones. In their adult state they are much less aquatic than frogs, but their spawn is. deposited in water, in which their tadpoles live like those of frogs. They are commonly regarded with disgust, on account of their appearance, the exudation from the skin, and the smell of many of them, yet the eye of the toad is remarkable beautiful. A notion. has very generally prevailed that the exudation of the skin is venomous, but it is ua,up ported by evidence, and toads are handled with perfect impunity. They are eaten by some savage tribes.—Only two species are British. The COMMON TOAD (B. vulgarie) is abundant in most parts of Britain, and in the western parts of Europe, but is not found in Ireland. A description of it is unnecessary. It spends the winter in a dormant state, and issues from its retreat on the return of spring. Its spawn is deposited in March or April, and much resembles that of the frog, but the ova are smaller and more numerous. The young toad is very small when it loses its tail and gills, and exchanges the tadpole for the adult form. Toads are very useful in gardens, in preventing the excessive increase of some kinds of insects; and on this account it is a frequent practice to put them into hot-bed frames, for which use the market gardeners of the neighbor hood of London often purchase them at the price of fourpence each. They have occa
sionally been tamed, and display some intelligence, readily recognizing those who feed them and are kind to them. A tame toad, of which an account is given by Pennant in his British Zoology, lived for more than 40 years, and was at last killed by a raven.
Numerous instances are on record in which toads are said to have been found embedded in rocks, walls, and even in the trunks of trees, where the necessary conclu sion is that they must have lived a very long time, in a dormant state. Unfortunately, however, the discovery of these toads has almost always been made by unscientific per sons, and there is a want of proper and trustworthy observations as to the places in which they have been found. Attempts have been made by several naturalists, and among others by the late Dr. Buckland, to throw light on the subject by experiment, immuring toads in various ways. and the result, although showing that when air is not wholly excluded they are capable of living for a long time in their imprisonment, prob ably in a dormant state, is not favorable to the belief that such existence could extend over many years. An interesting account of Dr. Buckland's experiments will be found in Mr. F. Buckland's Curiosities of Natural History.
The other British species of toad is the NATTERJACK (B. calamita) which was first described as British by Pennant, and has since been found to be pretty abundant in some parts of England, and in the s.w. of Ireland, chiefly in the vicinity of the sea. It much resembles the common toad, but is of a yellowish-brown color, clouded with dull olive, a bright yellow line passing along the middle of the back. It has a disgusting smell. It never hops, and its motion is more like walking or running than the crawling of the common toad.—Several other species of toad are found in Europe. Some of those found in tropical countries attain a very large size, and exhibit protuberances of various kinds, far exceeding even in proportion the warty excrescences of the common toad.