Sonoran Green Toad (Anaxyrus retiformis)
Description: The Sonoran green toad is small, reaching only 2 1/2 inches in length. Brightly colored, this toad is green to greenish-yellow with reticulations (net-like lines) or spots of black or brown on the back and legs, and numerous small, black-tipped warts on the back and sides. The underside is white with an occasional speck or two of black. The parotoid glands are large. Males have a dark throat.
Habitat: Its typical habitat is arid and semi-arid plains with grass, creosote bush, mesquite and saguaro.
Range: he Sonoran green toad is endemic to the counties of Pima and Pinal in Arizona in the south western United States and to northern Mexico. In the United States its range extends from near Mobile southwards to the San Cristobal Wash and the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument and eastwards to the Mission San Xavier del Bac and the Altar Valley.
Found in these States:
AZ
Diet: Sonoran Green toads feed on spiders, insects, lizards, snails, centipedes, and other amphibians in the wild.
Reproduction: Breeding takes place in July and August, the males appearing at breeding sites one to two days after heavy rain has fallen. The sites chosen are ditches, temporary pools, creek beds and cattle tanks. The males call from low vegetation within a few feet of the water. The call has been described as resembling "the buzzer on an electric alarm clock". When a female arrives in response to the male, they move together into the water, amplexus occurs and a batch of eggs is laid. The temporary waterbodies tend to dry up rapidly and it is thought that the eggs hatch within three days and the tadpoles develop to metamorphosis in two to three weeks
Status: Globally it is classified as a species of least concern. In Arizona it is classified as Vulnerable.
Subspecies: None
»» Kingdom: Animalia - Animals
»» Phylum: Chordata - Chordates
»» Subphylum: Vertebrata - Vertebrates
»» Class: Amphibia - Amphibians
»» Order: Anura - Frogs & Toads
»» Family: Bufonidae - Toads
»» Genus: Anaxyrus
»» Species: Anaxyrus retiformis - Sonoran Green Toad
This article uses material from the Wikipedia article "Sonoran Green Toad", which is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike License 3.0. Content may have been omitted from the original, but no content has been changed or extended.
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