Cane Toad Hordes Heading South
Illawarra Mercury
Monday March 13, 2000
Cane toads can weigh up to half a kilo, have rough, warty, dry skin, large poison glands on each shoulder and a pointed snout with a bony ridge.
And they are no longer a Queensland problem - cane toads are on the march to Wollongong.
The NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) launched a campaign yesterday warning people from Sydney and the Illawarra to be on the lookout for the ugly beasties.
Stowaway toads, transported south from Queensland and northern NSW by unwary tourists and truckies, have already been sighted in the Illawarra.
A year ago Oliver Wady found a cane toad ``hiding out" in his Fairy Meadow backyard at the base of a drain pipe.
The former Tweed Heads resident recognised the public menace immediately.
``They are easy to spot and I wouldn't like to see any more of them in Wollongong," he said.
``They are just a breeding and eating machine and they have no natural predators.
``Their potential to knock out other frog species, like the green and gold bell frog, is enormous."
Mr Wady said he grabbed the pest with a glove and put it in the freezer because that was the ``most humane way of killing it".
NPWS pest management officer Andrew Leys said while sightings in the Illawarra had been of individual cane toads rather than colonies, the pests were quick breeders and thrived in a wide variety of habitats.
When they were first introduced from South America in 1935 to control cane beetles it was thought they could only survive in tropical climates.
But Mr Leys said temperature wasn't a limiting factor and theoretically cane toads could survive as far south as the Victorian border.
``Whether they would survive in the Illawarra or not we don't know but it could be possible for them to establish in Wollongong," he said.
Environment Minister Bob Debus has called for community support in a cane toad clean-up campaign to halt the spread of the pest further south into NSW.
He said the cane toad had established colonies as far south as Port Macquarie.
Mr Debus urged people to contact the NPWS if they were uncertain whether a specimen was a cane toad. He said the campaign, similar to Clean Up Australia Day, could be effective in stopping the toads' march down the east coast.
© 2000 Illawarra Mercury