Toads in pool strainer...

My wife is house/dog sitting for a co-worker in Virginia Beach. The house has a beutiful built in pool. I was drawn to the pool filter strainers,kinda hoping to find something. BINGO! There were lots of leaves in there, too. No telling how long they been treading pool water. The one was so little and fat I was thinking it wasn't the same as the big one.

I wonder what happens to frogs and toads in swimming pools. Do they hop out or die? And do the ones that hop out die later of chlorine poisoning? Did you keep these and are they still alive?

The one on the right looks like an american toad, Anaxyrus americanus. Image: http://www.virginiah...mericantoad.jpg
The one on the left could be a gray treefrog, Hyla versicolor. Image: http://www.virginiah...treefrog002.JPG

ID guide: http://www.virginiah...of_virginia.htm

Edited by EricaWieser, 20 August 2011 - 08:51 PM.

I let these go. The neither hopped off. The big one moved a few inches to hide where the grass meets the patio. I put the little into the grass since it wasn't moving much. If I go back I'll look for them.

My Aunt once had a new pool in her once wooded yard. I filled with salamanders. They would get mushy and die.

Thanks for the cool link.

Edited by njJohn, 20 August 2011 - 08:58 PM.

They're both toads (Anaxyrus), as Hyla don't have parotoid glands. With that being said, I can't see number of warts per dorsal blotch or parotoid/cranial crest orientation to call it fowleri or americanus; however, I rarely see brick red fowleri (more green/yellowish). The visible portion of both venters lack mottling, which is something typically associated with fowleri. While toads seem to break all the rules, having them in hand and hearing their call helps tremendously with ID.

Blake

Edited by blakemarkwell, 20 August 2011 - 11:30 PM.

The bloated little fella on the left seems to be missing its feet?

I was looking for toe pads to see if it's a gray treefrog, but I don't see its feet.

I have seen gray treefrogs in a pool here in western North Carolina, and my sister in-law has them in Atlanta in her outdoor water feature.

Another possibility is southern toad, terrestris.
So, what happened to Bufo ? I missed this name switch.

Essentially, Bufo became unwieldy and a unnatural grouping, as clades within Bufo sensu lato were more closely related to other genera than to some of the taxa within Bufo. In fact, the North American bufonids (now separated into Anaxyrus, Incilius, and Rhinella) were grouped far away from the European Bufo bufo in cladograms, so they were dropped from Bufo and Anaxyrus was resurrected to include ~22 of our ~25 species of toads. Additionally, Anaxyrus either forms a sister relationship to the other two genera in North America, Incilius and Rhinella, or to Incilius alone.

Of course, this isn't universally accepted but Anaxyrus forms a nice monophyletic group and many in the non-accepting category are just contributing to the social inertia that hampers the true (or truer) evolutionary relationship of these groups (just like what is happening with Nothonotus!).

Blake

Depending on where in Virginia Beach, American Toads may be out of range, but that large one does look pretty American. The only other possibilities would be Fowler's (which the large one doesn't look like) or Southern. It is one of those 3, with Fowler's only a possibility for the small one, not the large. Next time try and get a shot straight down, a belly shot and a shot of the hind legs, especially if it is a young toad.

Gerald, Blake summed up a bit with the toads (and I am not too opposed to some of the changes) and it changed a few years back. Herp taxonomy as a whole is changing faster than anyone can keep up with and not always for the better due to momentum from a few key people. For a good example just look at the Rat Snakes...