The Great Plains toad, ''

Anaxyrus ''Anaxyrus'' is a genus of true toads in the family Bufonidae. The genus is endemic to North and Central America. Some authors consider ''Anaxyrus'' to be a subgenus In biology, a subgenus (plural: subgenera) is a taxonomic rank directly below ...

cognatus'', is a relatively large

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

true toad A true toad is any member of the family Bufonidae, in the order Anura (frogs and toads). This is the only family of anurans in which all members are known as toads, although some may be called frogs (such as harlequin frogs). The bufonids now ...

native to central North America.

Distribution

The amphibian is native throughout the

Canadian Prairies The Canadian Prairies (usually referred to as simply the Prairies in Canada) is a region in Western Canada. It includes the Canadian portion of the Great Plains and the Prairie Provinces, namely Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. These provin ...

(northern Great Plains) in southern

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

Manitoba , image_map = Manitoba in Canada 2.svg , map_alt = Map showing Manitoba's location in the centre of Southern Canada , Label_map = yes , coordinates = , capital = Winn ...

, and

Saskatchewan Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a province in western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on the south by the U.S. states of Montana and North Dak ...

; and into

northern Mexico Northern Mexico ( es, el Norte de México ), commonly referred as , is an informal term for the northern cultural and geographical area in Mexico. Depending on the source, it contains some or all of the states of Baja California, Baja California ...

in the

Sonoran Desert The Sonoran Desert ( es, Desierto de Sonora) is a desert in North America and ecoregion that covers the northwestern Mexican states of Sonora, Baja California, and Baja California Sur, as well as part of the southwestern United States (in Ariz ...

and

Mexican Plateau The Central Mexican Plateau, also known as the Mexican Altiplano ( es, Altiplanicie Mexicana), is a large arid-to-semiarid plateau that occupies much of northern and central Mexico. Averaging above sea level, it extends from the United States b ...

Description

The Great Plains toad is

grey Grey (more common in British English) or gray (more common in American English) is an intermediate color between black and white. It is a neutral or achromatic color, meaning literally that it is "without color", because it can be composed o ...

brown Brown is a color. It can be considered a composite color, but it is mainly a darker shade of orange. In the CMYK color model used in printing or painting, brown is usually made by combining the colors orange and black. In the RGB color model us ...

, and

green Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by a combi ...

in color, with darker colored blotching. It can grow to anywhere between in length. Its primary

diet Diet may refer to: Food * Diet (nutrition), the sum of the food consumed by an organism or group * Dieting, the deliberate selection of food to control body weight or nutrient intake ** Diet food, foods that aid in creating a diet for weight loss ...

is various species of

cutworm Cutworms are moth larvae that hide under litter or soil during the day, coming out in the dark to feed on plants. A larva typically attacks the first part of the plant it encounters, namely the stem, often of a seedling, and consequently cuts it ...

s. It prefers grassland habitat with loose soil that is easy to burrow in. Breeding occurs throughout the spring and summer months, most often immediately after heavy rainfall. In dry areas it may only emerge from its burrow for a few weeks when conditions are right, and usually at night, but in areas with permanent water bodies and abundant rain it may be active all day.Grismer, L. L. (2002). ''Amphibians and Reptiles of Baja California''. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 69. Its

mating call A mating call is the auditory signal used by animals to attract mates. It can occur in males or females, but literature is abundantly favored toward researching mating calls in females. In addition, mating calls are often the subject of mate choic ...

is a very loud, harsh chirping noise repeated many times, very fast.

Ecology

The great plains toad feeds a range of insects such as lepidopterans, dipterans, hymenopterans, coleopterans, ants, and termites. The toad is preyed upon by the plains garter snake (''Thamnophis radix''), among others. It uses chemoreceptors to sense chemical cues left by the snake. The great plains toad occur in deserts, grasslands, semi-desert shrublands, open floodplains, and agricultural areas. When inactive they burrow underground. Breeding takes place in temporary water bodies such as rain pools, flooded areas, and ponds; they can also use margins of reservoirs. The eggs and larvae develop in shallow water and metamorphose after 17 to 45 days.

Conservations

The Great Plains toad has wide distribution and is not considered threatened, although it may suffer from road kills, farming, and suburban sprawl, increased droughts, and urbanization.

References

Further sources

* *
Herps of Texas: ''Bufo cognatus''

External links

*
IUCN Red List.org: ''Anaxyrus cognatus'' (Great Plains Toad)
{{Taxonbar, from=Q28030930 Great Plains Amphibians of Canada Amphibians of Mexico Amphibians of the United States Great Plains toad Fauna of Northern Mexico Fauna of the Plains-Midwest (United States) Fauna of the Western United States Fauna of the Southwestern United States Fauna of the Colorado Desert Fauna of the Sonoran Desert Amphibians described in 1822 Least concern biota of the United States