Control of the Invasive Species
3) Meat ants
Meat ants are another way that Cane Toads are being controlled. Meat ants are carnivorous ants that are found in Australia which are one of the solutions to the invasion of Cane Toads (Collerton). This idea came up by professor Rick Shine from the University of Sydney (Collerton). He said that he knew that many meat ants in the wild already consumed baby cane toads and he felt like these carnivorous ants could be used for decreasing and controlling the Cane Toad once and for all (Collerton). Shine used cat food to trigger an experiment on the meat ants (Collerton). Cat food is one of the foods that the meat ants love the best because of its greasiness (Collerton). What Shine did was he put cat food near where toads were coming out from the water (Collerton). Shine said that the results were impressive because in a span of two minutes 90% of the toads were attacked and 70% were killed (Collerton). Also, according to Shine, there is no worry of the meat ants attacking native frogs because they have evolved in that area for decades and they did a good job of avoiding meat ants in the experiment whilst since Cane Toads were only introduced recently, it is hard for them to get used to the surrounding species including meat ants (Collerton). Also, since the species of meat ants were already living in that area, it is not harmful to the environment and doesn’t become an invasive species (Jabr). One can look at video 3 to see meat ants attacking Cane toads. Also, Figure 21 is a close up of meat ants attacking Cane toads.
1) Traps
Traps are the most classic way of controlling the Cane Toad. Many companies make high technological traps in order to catch more cane toads. Traps are not regular traps that people might think. Firstly, based on the Cane Toad trap that John Cook University and the Animal Control Technologies Australia made, they have a door that is easy to get into for the Toads but not possible to get out (“ACTA & JCU tackle the cane toad”). Also, they have lights on some of the traps so that insects can be attracted, thus attracting the Cane toad to consume the insects since their nutrition includes insects (“ACTA & JCU tackle the cane toad”). These lights are ultra-violet or neon (“ACTA & JCU tackle the cane toad”) Also, there are sounds added in the traps as well for playing mating calls to attract the Cane Toads as well (“ACTA & JCU tackle the cane toad”). In Graph 1, one can see the mean number of toads caught per night at the John Cook University. One can read that about three and a half make toads and one and a half female toads were caught. In total about five toads are caught each night. Even though this isn’t a huge amount of toad, traps are still used in order to control Cane Toads. The shape of the Cane Toad trap can be seen in figure 19.
2) Using Cane Toad Tadpole Toxins
Another way that cane toads are being caught is by using the Cane Toad Toxins against the Cane Toads (Johnson). An experiment done by Rick Shine, a professor at the University of Sydney School of Biological Sciences proved this to be indeed true (Johnson). They had caught in one-night 10,000 cane toad tadpoles in less than 10 traps (Johnson). Shine used the principle that when Cane Toads are Tadpoles they compete with each other for resources and that one or the other end of eating each other which is an act of cannibalism (Johnson). Also, Shine found out that the tadpoles find each other by detecting scents of poison that trace out from the egg or the tadpole (Johnson). By putting some Cane Toad eggs in a net like trap and waiting for Tadpoles to come, this helps catch multiple tadpoles which as potential Cane Toads (Johnson). This also makes a same effect as stopping offspring from spreading (Johnson). Shine mentions that even if one traps adult Cane Toads, the population will not decrease due to its rapid breeding (Pearlman). The only way that one can make catching adult Cane Toads work is if one also catches the soon to be Cane Toads which are the tadpoles (Pearlman). In figure 20 one can see the tadpoles of the Cane Toad.