Description
 The Fowler's toad is 2½ -3¾ inches in length. Females are larger than males. It has a short, rounded snout and a round body with a light stripe down the middle of its back. It is gray to brown on its uppersides and cream colored on its undersides. Males have a darker throat than females. It has dark brown spots and splotches that contain three or more warts on its upperside. When it is attacked, the Fowler's toad can excrete a toxin on its back that can make small predators sick!
Range
 Fowler's toad is found in most areas of eastern United States from southern New Hampshire south to northern Florida and west to Michigan, eastern Oklahoma and eastern Texas. Fowler's toad is also found in Canada on the banks of e Erie.
Habitat
 Fowler's toad is found woodlands, meadows, prairies, ditches, roadsides, gardens, yards, sand dunes, and lake shores. It prefers areas with loose sandy of gravelly soil that it can burrow into. |
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Diet
The Fowler's toad uses its tongue to snap up insects and other invertebrates.
Life Cycle
 Male Fowler's toads migrates to breeding grounds from March to June and then call out to the females. They breed in shallow water in ponds, lakes, or marshes. The female lays a string of egg. There may be as many as 10,000 eggs in a string, although most strings have about 5,000 eggs! The male then fertilizes the eggs by discharging fluid with sperm in it onto the eggs. The eggs are attached to vegetation in the shallow water. The tadpoles hatch in about a week and become toads in about a few months. They reach breeding age when they are two years old.
They have a lifespan of around five years.
Behavior
 The Fowler's toad is mostly nocturnal. It spends daylight hours under cover. When cold weather arrives, it burrows into the ground and hibernates.
It has a distinctive sheep-like "whah, whah, whah" call. The Fowler's toad is named for S.P. Fowler, a naturalist from Massachusetts who identified the toad in 1858.
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