Exploding toad

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An exploding toad occurs when a crow, hunting for toad liver, attacks a puffed up toad. The phenomenon was first noticed in April 2005 in districts of Hamburg, Germany and near a lake at Låsby, Denmark, dubbed "The Pond of Death." No other animals in the area were exploding.

What differentiates the exploding toads in these incidents from most other exploding animals is that they explode while alive. Exploding whales, for example, are a result of the buildup of gases during the process of decomposition (the obvious exception is when the use of dynamite is involved).

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[edit] Description

According to worldwide media reports in late April 2005, numerous toads in the Altona district of Hamburg were observed by nature protection officials to swell up with gases and explode, propelling their innards for distances of up to one meter. These incidents prompted local residents to refer to the area's lake—home to the toads—as "Tümpel des Todes" (Pool of Death). The incidents were reported as occurring with greatest frequency between 2 and 3 a.m. Werner Smolnik, environmental movement worker, stated on April 26, 2005 at least 1,000 toads had died in this manner over a series of a few days.

According to a witness, "toads swell up to three-and-a-half times their normal size before blowing up". It is unlikely that a toad, however bluffy, could inhale and store so much air.

[edit] Explanations

Berlin veterinarian Franz Mutschmann collected corpses and performed autopsies. From his work, it was determined that the phenomenon was linked to a recent influx of predatory crows to the area. The cause was a mixture of crow attacks and the natural puff up defense of the toads. Crows attacked the toads to pick through the skin between the amphibian's chest and abdominal cavity, picking out the liver, which appears to be a delicacy for crows in the area. In a defensive move, the toads begin to blow themselves up, which in turn, due to the hole in the toad's body and the missing liver, led to a rupture of blood vessels and lungs, and to the spreading of intestines. The apparent epidemic nature of the phenomenon was also explained by Mutschmann: "Crows are intelligent animals. They learn very quickly how to eat the toads' livers."

Previous explanations included a viral or fungal infection, possibly one also affecting foreign horses involved in racing at a nearby track. However, laboratory tests were unable to detect an infectious agent.[1] Danish biologists suggested pesticides as an explanation. Yet another explanation was that increased ultraviolet radiation caused by ozone depletion was to blame.

Another opinion was that the eye witness accounts were flawed, confused, or mistaken.

[edit] Exploding amphibians in popular culture

  • In a story titled "The Frog and the Ox" of the Aesop's Fables, a frog, seeing an ox walking by, wanted to become as large and powerful as the ox. The poor frog filled itself full of air again and again. It exploded as a result.
  • In the film Reflecting Skin, two boys insert a drinking straw into a toad's cloaca and inflate it, leaving it on the side of a path. The first person to come by and see the poor suffering toad bends over to inspect it, only to have it explode all over them when the boys shoot it with a slingshot.
  • A widely-circulated urban legend claims that you can explode a toad by putting a cigarette in its mouth because toads inhale through their mouths but they exhale through their skin. If the air is too polluted this process cannot be completed and the gases continue to build up until they explode. This is not true: frogs and toads are amphibians, and even though amphibian skin can perform gas exchange, it is unrelated to lung expiration (see: buccal pumping). Even if the frog or toad keeps performing non-stop inhalation, which is impossible anyway, the air would not build up in its body and cause it to explode.
  • The experimental music group Coil wrote a song called "Omlagus Garfungiloops" that features a voice sample saying "Have you been exploding frogs again?". The title of the song is based on taking the above voice sample and playing parts of it backwards to achieve a strange non-language.
  • In the Playstation game Final Fantasy Tactics, Malak sends a toad to give Ramza a message. The toad explodes and startles Ramza after it stops talking.
  • In the background of the game Warhammer 40,000, one of the many deadly creatures that inhabits the Death World of Catachan is the Great (and Lesser) Catachan Barking Toad, which when threatened, explodes into a cloud of toxins that kills all life in the immediate area, an area that can stretch for a kilometer, in the case of the Great Barking Toad.
  • In the DreamWorks animated feature film Shrek, a toad (and a snake) are inflated as balloons by Shrek and Fiona. They do not explode, but as a result of Fiona's high-pitched singing, a bird does.
  • The game Thief 2 includes Frogbeast Eggs as a weapon that Garrett, the main character, can use. They release small frogs, which hop towards the nearest person (possibly including Garrett himself) and explode.
  • In the 2003 comic book to film adaptation Hulk, a failed experiment on regenerative healing causes a frog to explode. This causes Bruce Banner to quip, "You want to go to the review board on Monday and tell them we have developed a brand new method for exploding frogs?"
  • In a number of popular mods to the popular science fiction action game Half-Life, one-eyed Chumtoads that may explode and sometimes also spit poison are added as a monster type. Sometimes these are also usable as weapons in the same manner as the Snark.
  • In the computer game Serious Sam, froglike alien amphibians hop toward the player and explode on contact. Although individually weak and easily killed, these enemies often appear in large swarms.

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Hungry crows may be behind exploding toads", msnbc.com, Microsoft, April 28, 2005. Retrieved on 2007-11-22. 

[edit] See also

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Exploding animals and other exploding organisms
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