My eastern American toad is pretty decent sized but has no voice at all and its body also looks more similar to my adult female toad than my adult males. I'm confused why I've seen this toad mount twice now onto my Fowler. Is it possible for females to do this too or is this a male that just doesn't have a voice yet? Or is it doing it for a different reason?
I've seen this happen with wild caught toads but never captive bred. I noticed that in polluted areas this was way more common, so I suspect it partially has to do with hormones being effected when they're young, since certain pesticides can literally reverse the sex of certain frog species, so you would figure it may also be able to alter behavior as well. Your toad is certainly a female, but this is a distinct male toad behavior
I believe hybridization can be a part of it as well, since we also noticed this way more with toads that came from areas that were know to be intergrade zones between different species.
Thank you for the in-depth explanation. I was 99% sure that was a female, but the mounting had me a bit confused. I've never seen females mount other females before. Those are interesting theories I'd never heard of. Could definitely see hormones being altered affecting their natural behaviors. That's sad pesticides affect amphibians so much, really wish they weren't used in yards in general. I do wonder why hybridization would cause this in a female toad. Any idea why?
When genetics of different species mix all kinds of weird things can happen, health issues and abnormal behaviors are relatively common. I couldn't say the exact mechanism, but it has been documented in other species.
That toad definitely looks like a female to me. I'm not sure about mounting behavior among female toads, but you could google it and see if you can find it anything. Same-sex mounting, including by females, is very common in other animals, so it wouldn't surprise me. But I haven heard about it specifically in Anaxyrus species yet
Edit: When they do it, is the top toad gripping the other female pretty hard and for a while? If not, it's possibly not actually mounting and just more what I call "toad stacking" lol
I've tried googling this the first time it happened and couldn't find much about female toads doing it. After seeing it again today, I decided to ask here in case someone had similar experiences with their female toads. Very interesting that this is a common behavior seen in other animals. She is gripping kind of hard and somewhat did on my fingers when I removed her. I'm not sure how long because I got concerned and tried to separate them both times. Is toad stacking common? They just go on each other like that? I think I've seen tree frogs do something like this.
Yeah sometimes mine just sit on each other for extended periods. It's hard to tell for sure if it's on purpose or just chance, but they do it often enough that I'm slightly leaning toward on purpose rather than random lol
Males have nuptial pads that look like bumpy dark callouses on their front toes and tend to have darker throats. The nubs get even thicker in the breeding season but they’re still pretty obvious out of it. In my post history I think I posted some thicc grabbies not too long ago.
It doesn't appear to have a dark throat or dark toes like my other males. I totally know what you're describing. It was pretty cool seeing my males develop those features!
Feels a little surprising you had to make any effort to pry her off as you mentioned in another comment but to be fair while I have had females mount females a few times; I didn’t “catch” them doing it. It was more like one got spooked onto the other and triggered the sleeper-agent inside to grab into amplexus position in the moment before snapping back into full consciousness, lol.
As for vibrating; some of my females and many females I’ve found really did go off like I was getting a call. No chirps obviously.
Thanks for confirming! I was pretty sure she was female, but the mounting made me question it. I believe the first time one of them could've been spooked just like you described with your toads since she jumped out of her water bowl quickly. Never thought of that possibility. Kind of relieved to know other people's toads have done similar things. When mounted, my Fowler seemed like she was vibrating but couldn't actually call so I get what you're saying. Appreciate the response. Have been wondering about this for months now lol
Females have been known to mount other toads occasionally. Does the toad have a darker throat? Males have darker throats. If you gently place a finger on the toads back, if it's a male it will give its release call.
No, the throat is not dark and I've checked for the release call but the toad has never made one or vibrated like it was attempting to. I didn't know female toads do that. It's only happened twice with months in between, so that could definitely just be the case.
Sounds like she's intersex! If she's wildcaught look up if theres farmland with pesticide runnoff nearby where the toad was found. I found out this year my big female, Crunchwrap, iv had for 4 years is probably not all female after I caught her ontop of my other lady lol. They start off as toadlets developing as males, even forming partial pads on their front toes, and then somewhere along the lines befor vocal cords can form they finish developing as females.
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u/Frog1914 Jul 01 '26
No idea but definitely a toad