Bufo bufo

The Common Toad

The Common, also called the European toad, is the largest toad, inhabiting Europe, North-western part of Africa, Caucasus, Korea, Japan, South-west China and South Siberia. Their bodies tend to be wider, that other toads’. They are terrestrial amphibians. The colour of their bodies varies greatly, depending on their sex, age, the time of the year and season. The most common colour is grey, though species with olive-coloured, dark-brown, terracotta and sand-coloured skin exist as well. The colour of the stomach is usually a kind of soiled-white or yellowy type of colour.The eye colour varies between different shades of yellow with a sharp black horizontal pupil.

Background information

These amphibians tend to inhabit moist areas and closed biotopes, such as forests, old gardens, parks, steep narrow valleys, trots and moist basements. 
The Common toad is a nocturnal animal, hiding in the burrows of moles and mice during daytime in its natural habitat. These toads are considered "big" in biology, as they grow up to 18-20 cm.

Terrarium

The size of the tank for a grown Common toad should not be smaller than 30*30*20 cm (W*D*H). A 200l tank would be enough for 4 or 5 grown Common toad species.
Do not forget to place a couple of hiding places, such as small caves, branches, bark or specialised hiding places for amphibians/reptiles per toad.
Place a bowl of water in the more cold and moist part of the tank and change the water regularly. 

Substrate

Very often toads dig holes in the ground. Therefore, you must ensure that the amount of substrate is enough for the toad to hide in. I would recommend you to either use one of the following or the combination of the following substrates: a mix of (disinfected) dry leaves, finely crushed turf, sphagnum moss, coconut flakes and coconut chips, decorative flower soil and (disinfected) sand (however sand must not be used as the main substrate, but only with the combination of another substrate type).
By now, if you have been following my latest post in the blog, it goes without saying, that the substrate for most amphibians should always be moist, though, NOT slushy or muddy. Oh, and make the substrate 3-5 cm deep for the juvenile and 5-10 cm deep for the grown toads.

Ventilation

For the prevention of stagnation of the moist in the terrarium, the tank should have good ventilation. I would recommend to place the ventilation holes in the front-bottom and top back corners of the tank. Or, if you are keeping your toad in a plastic tank with a ventilation lid, keep it like it is :)

Temperature, Light & Humidity

Luckily, the Common toad is a very ‘undemanding’ species of amphibians, as it does not require any special temperature, humidity or light conditions. It is, of course, recommended to keep the toad at the same conditions as the habitat is has previously been living in before your home. So if you have bought the toad from a person, who has kept it at a higher temperature, you would want to keep the temperature at the same level as it was with the previous keeper if you don't want to see your pet dead.

The temperature for keeping this toad species varies from 16 to 26 ºC, preferably 21 - 23 ºC. The humidity level lies in-between 45 and 85 % with the optimum of 55 - 60%. Needless to say, these toads can survive temperatures of 5 ºC and 40 ºC, though, I would not experiment with this data on your toad.The light does not play a significant role either. Even though these amphibians are nocturnal animals, you can easily train them to take their food during the day by shortening their nighttime. Once in a while spray the tank with lukewarm water from a pulveriser.

Feeding

The feeding process of amphibians has been the main reason for me to start collecting them, as each group of species has its own interesting distinctive features in hunting, attacking, fighting and swallowing their prey.
Bufo bufo might seem as a ‘boring’ choice of an exotic animal for keeping at home, though its hunting and swallowing method is very interesting to observe. Now I am writing this document as a separate file on my computer and hopefully I will remember to post a video of my Common toad attacking and eating a cricket in the end of this post.
What do you feed a Common toad? If you have a grown toad, feeding should be no problem: once in every 3-5 days you should feed your toad a couple of small crickets, a slug, bloodworms, flies, cockroaches, an earthworm, a mealworm (cut off its head before giving the it to the toad, as the larva can eat its way out of the stomach of your amphibian) (do not feed your toad the African Zophobas mealworms), a small goldfish or even a small mouse. Once in every 2-3 weeks you should cover the food/prey in a multivitamin+Calcium powder mix for better digestion and prevention of various diseases.

If you have a juvenile Common toad, you will need to feed it every 2 days. It is okay, if it doesn’t want to eat when you place the food in the tank. Sometimes, the toads (even juvenile) reject food for more than 8-9 days. Do not feed the juvenile species any prey with hard bodies/chitin, such as mealworms or some cockroaches. The length of the prey should not exceed the length of the distance between the two eyes of the juvenile toad. I would recommend to feed it small crickets, small grasshoppers, wingless morphs of flies and bloodworms. 
Now, it is VERY important to add Calcium and Vitamins B1, B2, B6, B12, D (or just a reptile multivitamin mix, sold in your local pet shop) (you could also add Calcium glycerophosphate). All of the above should be given to your amphibian every second-third feeding session in the form of the prey, covered in the powder of the vitamins and minerals. Rickets is the most common disease among reptiles and amphibians, caused by hypovitaminosis, especially the lack of vitamin D.

Breeding

Males are ready for breeding at the age of three, while females need four years.

Extra information

• The common toad does secrete toxins thorough its dermal glands, however, they cause no harm to humans in any way, as they are only a weak type of poison. The most active glands are located behind the toad’s “ears” and are normally activated when the toad is being swallowed by a predator. Those predators are various types of snakes, such as corn snakes, grass snakes and European vipers, then hedgehogs, rats, dogs and raptorial birds which also feed on the Common toad. When attacked, the toad takes the “defence” form by standing up on all it’s four legs and puffing up it’s body.
• When moving around, the toad does not jump: instead the toad walks like most terrestrial animals, very similar to the walking style of Leopard geckos and crocodiles.
• There are eight sub-species of Bufo bufo.
• The toad lives up to 35 years in its natural habitat.
• During the breeding season, three of the male Common toad’s fingers turn jet-black.
• Oh, and they usually don’t bite (or at least it doesn’t hurt).

Here is the video of my toad: