4 ms·

> "They've got an incredible breeding capacity... so with every female cane toad that's removed from the environment, it's the prevention of up to 70,000 new ca

> "They've got an incredible breeding capacity... so with every female cane toad that's removed from the environment, it's the prevention of up to 70,000 new cane toads each year," Ms Vincent says. Wow. That's a lot of toads!

bell-cot 4y ago
Big grain of salt: If cane toad populations actually grew at anything remotely close to 70,000X per generation...it would take less than 6 generation for the descendants of one male/female pair of cane toads to have a larger mass than the planet Earth.
- jandrese 4y ago
  This is the same calculation you can make about swatting a fly when you were a kid. In reality the population of the cane toad/fly is roughly what the environment will support. Killing individuals makes little to no difference.
  - bell-cot 4y ago
    > Killing individuals makes little to no difference. One or a few, here & there? Yes, true. But talk to someone who's worked at removing invasive plant species for a decade or two, and recalls the "before". If the mortality rate of $Invasive can be seriously pushed up for several generations, in a modest-sized area, then the local population of $Invasive can often be reduced by 10X to 1000X. That is not wiping it out - but it's enough to hugely reduce the environmental damage caused by $Invasive. (Yes, a toad can get around far more than a plant. OTOH, birds can't eat berries off a toad, then poop out seeds 25km away. And there's probably no soil seed bank - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soil_seed_bank https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soil_seed_bank - with toad eggs.)
    - a1369209993 4y ago
      > birds can't eat berries off a toad, then poop out seeds 25km away. And there's probably no soil seed bank[] with toad eggs. These sound like excellent ideas that I will definitely incorporate into the next invasive species I make. (Not sure if /s. Troll worldbuilding is fun.)

bell-cot 4y ago

Big grain of salt: If cane toad populations actually grew at anything remotely close to 70,000X per generation...it would take less than 6 generation for the descendants of one male/female pair of cane toads to have a larger mass than the planet Earth.

jandrese 4y ago
This is the same calculation you can make about swatting a fly when you were a kid. In reality the population of the cane toad/fly is roughly what the environment will support. Killing individuals makes little to no difference.
- bell-cot 4y ago
  > Killing individuals makes little to no difference. One or a few, here & there? Yes, true. But talk to someone who's worked at removing invasive plant species for a decade or two, and recalls the "before". If the mortality rate of $Invasive can be seriously pushed up for several generations, in a modest-sized area, then the local population of $Invasive can often be reduced by 10X to 1000X. That is not wiping it out - but it's enough to hugely reduce the environmental damage caused by $Invasive. (Yes, a toad can get around far more than a plant. OTOH, birds can't eat berries off a toad, then poop out seeds 25km away. And there's probably no soil seed bank - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soil_seed_bank https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soil_seed_bank - with toad eggs.)
  - a1369209993 4y ago
    > birds can't eat berries off a toad, then poop out seeds 25km away. And there's probably no soil seed bank[] with toad eggs. These sound like excellent ideas that I will definitely incorporate into the next invasive species I make. (Not sure if /s. Troll worldbuilding is fun.)