If you hear a low croaking sound “qwark-qwark-qwark” near ponds and wet woodland, it’s probably the call of the common toad (bufo bufo). As winter draws to an end, milder spells entice toads to emerge from under piles of wood or crawl out of muddy hideaways to forage of slugs, invertebrates and worms using their sticky tongues to catch their prey.

Then at some point in early spring toads undergo a mass migration, journeying back to their birthplace to reproduce. The cue for this is a spell of mild, damp weather and its one of nature’s wonders that they know to start their migration at the same time.

The woods around Bodenham Lake Nature Reserve contain a sizeable toad population but as it gets dark and the toads move from the woodland down to the water to breed, they face a perilous journey crossing a road that runs parallel to the nature reserve.

Luckily for the toads, the Wildlife Trust organises Toad Patrols between February and April along this lane. When temperatures are forecast to be above 7-8^oC in the early evening a call goes out for volunteers to help. Working in pairs, the patrol team scans the road for toads and transports them safely to the lakeside where they can find a mate and spawn. In some years as many as a thousand toads are collected by the patrols and released near the lake.

Once there, the male toads vie for the attention of a female, sometimes resorting to fighting with other males to secure a mate. In the water, the male uses special ‘nuptial’ pads to grasp the female while she lays her eggs. Toad spawn looks quite different to clumpy frog spawn, instead it’s two long strings of up to 1,500 eggs. Ten days later the tadpoles emerge and as they contain a toxin that make them unpleasant for fish to eat, they can survive in the lake.

After 16 weeks the toad tadpoles lose their tails and become toadlets leaving their spawning pond in May. Instead of hopping as frogs do, toads crawl away and seek out woodland, tussocky grassland, hedgerows or gardens to spend the rest of the year before the mass migration next spring.

Adult toads have the same foul-tasting toxin as the tadpole to keep them safe from predation. Despite this, common toads are in sharp decline. Research in 2016 by Froglife and the University of Zurich has shown that common toad populations across the UK have declined by 68% over the past 30 years. Toad patrols such as the one at Bodenham Lake by a team of dedicated volunteers is helping to ensure toad numbers in the area don’t decline any further.