Animal
American toad
The American toad is a brown, bumpy toad that lives in woods, fields and gardens. In spring, it sings a long, musical trill. It eats lots of bugs!
The American toad is a common, warty toad of eastern North America, found in forests, prairies, farms and backyards. It has big poison glands behind its eyes, hunts insects and worms at night, and in spring the males sing a long, musical trill from shallow ponds, where females lay thousands of eggs in long strings.
Anaxyrus americanus (formerly Bufo americanus) is a widespread true toad of eastern Canada and the eastern and central United States. Tolerant of disturbance, it breeds in almost any shallow, fish-poor water, protects itself with parotoid and skin-wart toxins, and is abundant, stable and Least Concern.
Photo: Cephas, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Meet the American toad
The American toad is a brown, bumpy toad.
It has big, shiny eyes and a big lump behind each eye. It hops in gardens and woods and eats lots of bugs.
The American toad is the toad many people in eastern North America find in their backyards. It is gray, greenish gray, brown or reddish brown, covered in warts, and often has dark spots on its back, each around one or two warts. Females are a little bigger than males.
Behind each eye is a big, bean-shaped bump called a parotoid gland, and above each eye is a bony ridge. Adults are usually about 5 to 9 centimeters long, and males have a dark throat.
Anaxyrus americanus is a true toad (family Bufonidae), moved from Bufo to Anaxyrus when studies showed that the old genus grouped species that were too different. Missouri's Department of Conservation gives an adult snout-to-vent length of 2 to 3 1/2 inches (about 5 to 9 centimeters), occasionally 6 inches, with females generally larger; males have a dark throat.
Key features include a kidney-shaped parotoid gland behind each eye and a cranial ridge above the eye that usually does not touch the gland, though a small spur may join them. Dark dorsal spots typically encircle one or two warts. Two subspecies occur in Missouri: the eastern American toad and the smaller dwarf American toad.
Quick facts
- Group
- Amphibian
- Length
- 5.1 to 9 cm
- Lifespan in the wild
- from 10 years
Where it lives
American toads live in Canada and the eastern United States.
They live in forests, fields, farms and gardens. In the daytime they hide under rocks and logs.
American toads live in eastern and central North America, from Labrador, the Hudson Bay area and Manitoba south to northern Texas, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia and North Carolina. They are missing from most of the flat coastal lowlands of the Southeast.
They can live almost anywhere with moisture and food: forests, prairies, fields, farms, parks and backyards. In the daytime they hide under rocks, logs and leaves or dig into loose soil, backing in with their hind legs.
The IUCN range runs from Labrador, the Hudson Bay region and Manitoba to northern Texas, Louisiana, central Alabama, northern Georgia and North Carolina, but excludes most of the Coastal Plain. Habitats range from forests to prairies, and the species tolerates disturbance; in New York its distribution seems to be influenced by soil pH.
In Missouri it prefers rocky, wooded upland edges of hardwood forest but also uses urban, suburban, agricultural and even mined land (MDC). Toads shelter by day under objects or burrow, digging backward with the hind feet, and they hibernate in soil or soft leaf litter (University of Maine Cooperative Extension).
Continent
Its habitats
Where can you find this animal?
- Lives here naturally · Countries and seas named by a scientific source
- Sightings recorded · Records of wild sightings (GBIF)
Lives here naturally · Countries and seas named by a scientific source
Forests, prairies, fields, farms and gardens from Labrador, the Hudson Bay area and Manitoba south to northern Texas, Louisiana, central Alabama, northern Georgia and North Carolina, but not most of the southeastern coastal plain or the western United States and Canada.
Places: Canada and United States.
Source: iucn-red-list · checked October 2026
Sightings recorded · Records of wild sightings (GBIF)
Counts of GBIF records of wild observations (human and machine) and preserved specimens. Records include introduced populations, vagrants, escaped or released animals and misidentifications, so a country with records is not necessarily part of the native range.
Wild sightings have been recorded in United States, Canada, China, Mexico, Costa Rica, Brazil, UK, Namibia and 1 more places.
Source: gbif · checked October 2026
Range maps show where scientists say an animal lives, often country by country. An animal may live in only part of a country shown, and sightings records can include animals that wandered far from home.
What it eats
American toads eat bugs, worms, slugs and spiders.
On summer nights, they catch insects that fall under porch lights. Their tadpoles eat algae.
American toads eat earthworms and many kinds of insects, plus slugs, spiders and centipedes. They mostly eat whatever is easy to find. On summer nights, toads often sit under outdoor lights and catch the insects that drop to the ground.
Because they eat so many insects, toads help keep pests in check in gardens and fields. Their tadpoles graze on algae in their pools.
Adults are generalist predators of earthworms and a wide variety of insects, as well as slugs, spiders, centipedes and insect larvae (MDC; University of Maine Cooperative Extension). Missouri's Department of Conservation notes they often feed under outdoor lights on summer nights, catching insects as they fall.
Toads are mainly active from dusk, though University of Maine Extension notes feeding from early morning into evening. Tadpoles feed on algae. As insect consumers, toads help keep invertebrate populations in balance, and the MDC describes them as useful to gardeners.
Did you know?
Tiny green plants help toad eggs breathe.
Green algae can live with American toad eggs and tadpoles, giving them oxygen while using their waste.
Eggs and tadpoles can form a mutually beneficial association with green algae: the algae appear to supply oxygen and use the embryos' carbon dioxide and wastes (MDC).
Warts and poison glands
The bumps behind a toad's eyes make a bad-tasting poison.
It keeps hungry animals away. Toads do not give people warts!
The big parotoid glands behind the eyes make a poison that gives the toad a nasty taste, so many predators leave it alone. The warts all over its body also release a substance that stings a predator's mouth and eyes.
Here is a mistaken idea to fix: toads do not give people warts. Missouri's wildlife experts call American toads harmless. The poison is only harmful if it is swallowed or gets into the eyes or mouth, so never put a toad near your face.
The kidney-shaped parotoid glands produce toxins that make the toad unpleasant to eat (University of Maine Cooperative Extension), and the warts over most of the body secrete toxins irritating to a predator's mucous membranes (MDC). Animal Diversity Web notes the poison is harmful only if swallowed or if it reaches the eyes or mouth.
Even so, toads have many predators at every stage, from water bugs and fish that eat eggs and tadpoles to grackles and raccoons. The MDC stresses that toads do not cause warts in humans.
From egg strings to toadlets
In spring, toads go to shallow ponds.
The mother lays thousands of eggs in long strings. Black tadpoles hatch, grow legs, lose their tails and hop out as tiny toads.
When spring brings warmer nights and longer days, American toads travel to shallow ponds, puddles, ditches and slow streams. The female lays thousands of eggs, from 2,000 up to 20,000, in two long strings of clear jelly wrapped around water plants or lying on the bottom.
The eggs hatch in about 3 to 12 days into tiny black tadpoles that swarm in the shallows. Their back legs start to form within about three weeks, then the front legs, and the tail is absorbed. After 5 to 10 weeks they become toadlets only about 1 centimeter long. They grow up in 2 to 4 years.
Breeding is triggered by warmer temperatures and longer days and begins in March or April (in Missouri calling starts in mid-March to early April and peaks from late April into May). Breeding sites include temporary pools, ditches, road ruts, ponds and slow, shallow streams, generally with few fish (IUCN). Females lay long double strands of eggs; counts vary by source, from 2,000 to 20,000 (MDC) or 4,000 to 12,000 (University of Maine Extension). Green algae can live in a mutually beneficial partnership with the eggs and tadpoles, apparently supplying oxygen.
Eggs hatch in 3 to 12 days. ADW reports hind limbs forming in the first 20 days, and metamorphosis takes 5 to 10 weeks, producing toadlets of 0.8 to 1.3 centimeters by late June or July. Sexual maturity follows in 2 to 4 years.
The spring trill
Boy toads sing in spring.
Their song is a long, high trill, like a whistle that keeps going. They puff up their throats to sing.
On warm spring nights, male American toads sit in shallow water and sing a long, high-pitched, musical trill. One trill can last 6 to 30 seconds! Like the males of most frogs and toads, they puff up a throat pouch to make the sound.
The rest of the year, American toads live alone. They spend the day hiding and come out around dusk to hunt. In winter they dig down into the soil or leaf litter and hibernate until spring.
The advertisement call is a sustained, high-pitched trill of 6 to 30 seconds (MDC; ADW gives 4 to 20 seconds), produced with a vocal sac, as in most male anurans (Australian Museum). Calling continues into July in Missouri, and ADW notes that many young males keep calling late into summer.
Outside the breeding season American toads are solitary, sheltering by day and becoming active at dusk. In parts of Missouri they hybridize with Fowler's toad and the Rocky Mountain toad, and the MDC links extensive human habitat disturbance to such hybridization.
Did you know?
Toads dig backward into the ground.
When an American toad digs a hiding place, it backs into the soil, pushing dirt away with its hind legs.
American toads burrow backward, using the hind feet to push soil aside, both for daytime shelter and to hibernate (ADW).
A common garden helper
There are lots of American toads.
They are not in danger. A garden with leaves, logs and a little pond is a great home for toads.
American toads are listed as least concern. They are widespread and abundant, their numbers are stable overall, and there are large areas of good habitat left. In a few places their numbers have dropped.
Toads are good neighbors: they eat garden pests and do people no harm. They breed in shallow water with few fish and hide under logs, rocks and leaves, so places like these matter to them.
The IUCN assessed Anaxyrus americanus in 2020 (published 2022) as Least Concern: widespread and abundant, stable overall with localized declines, and facing no major threats, with large areas of suitable habitat remaining and no records of use or trade. In northern Minnesota, successful breeding in acidic bog water is rare or absent.
It tolerates disturbed land and is familiar around homes, though disturbance can also promote hybridization with related toads (MDC). Fish-poor breeding pools and moist cover are its key needs.
IUCN Red List
How is the american toad doing in the wild?
- Least Concern (this animal)
- Near Threatened
- Vulnerable
- Endangered
- Critically Endangered
- Extinct in the Wild
- Extinct
Least Concern
Not at risk of disappearing from the wild right now.
See the IUCN Red List assessment · The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2022.2
Listen to American toads
Listen to the recording at the start of this page.
That long, buzzy trill is American toads singing in spring!
At the start of this page you can play a real recording of American toads, made on a May evening in 2020 in Guelph, Ontario, Canada.
Listen for the long, high, musical trill. Each trill comes from a male sitting in shallow water. Some trills go on for many seconds without stopping. Can you hold a hum that long?
The recording on this page was made by Ryan Hodnett in Guelph, Ontario, on the evening of May 20, 2020, during the breeding season. Listen for sustained, high-pitched trills; Missouri's Department of Conservation gives 6 to 30 seconds per trill, and Animal Diversity Web 4 to 20 seconds. The recording is titled for American toads in the plural, so more than one male may be trilling at once.
Did you know?
Toads do not give people warts!
Some people once believed that touching a toad gives you warts, but it is not true. Missouri's wildlife experts say toads are harmless.
The Missouri Department of Conservation notes that, contrary to superstition, toads do not cause warts in humans.
Amazing facts
-
Toads do not give people warts!
Some people once believed that touching a toad gives you warts, but it is not true. Missouri's wildlife experts say toads are harmless.
The Missouri Department of Conservation notes that, contrary to superstition, toads do not cause warts in humans.
-
Toads like to eat bugs under porch lights.
On summer nights, American toads often wait under outdoor lights to catch insects that fall to the ground.
Toads exploit insects attracted to artificial lights, a behavior often seen around homes on summer nights (MDC).
-
Tiny green plants help toad eggs breathe.
Green algae can live with American toad eggs and tadpoles, giving them oxygen while using their waste.
Eggs and tadpoles can form a mutually beneficial association with green algae: the algae appear to supply oxygen and use the embryos' carbon dioxide and wastes (MDC).
-
Toads dig backward into the ground.
When an American toad digs a hiding place, it backs into the soil, pushing dirt away with its hind legs.
American toads burrow backward, using the hind feet to push soil aside, both for daytime shelter and to hibernate (ADW).
Words to know
- parotoid gland
- a large gland behind a toad's eye that makes poison
- trill
- a long, fast, warbling sound
- toadlet
- a tiny young toad that has just left the water
- metamorphosis
- a big change in body shape as an animal grows, like a tadpole becoming a toad
- hibernate
- to rest deeply through the cold winter
- wart
- a small bump on a toad's skin
Discovery challenge
-
Can a toad give you warts?
Is it true that touching a toad gives you warts?
Do American toads cause warts in humans?
- Yes, always
- No, that is not true
- Only big toads do
Show the answer
No, that is not true
No! That is just a story. Toads do not give people warts.
No. It is an old superstition; toads do not cause warts.
No. The MDC notes that, contrary to superstition, toads do not cause human warts.
-
What does a boy American toad's song sound like?
What kind of call does a male American toad make?
How is the American toad's advertisement call described?
- A short croak
- A long, high, musical trill
- A loud quack
Show the answer
A long, high, musical trill
It sings a long, high trill.
A long, high-pitched, musical trill that can last 6 to 30 seconds.
A sustained, high-pitched trill of 6 to 30 seconds (MDC).
-
What do the bumps behind a toad's eyes make?
What do an American toad's parotoid glands do?
What is the function of the American toad's parotoid glands?
- They make a bad-tasting poison
- They help it hear
- They store water for swimming
Show the answer
They make a bad-tasting poison
They make a bad-tasting poison that keeps hungry animals away.
They make toxins that give the toad an unpleasant taste to predators.
They secrete toxins that make the toad unpalatable.
-
How do American toads lay their eggs?
How are American toad eggs laid?
How does a female American toad deposit her eggs?
- In long strings in shallow water
- One at a time in a tree
- In a nest on dry land
Show the answer
In long strings in shallow water
In long strings in shallow water.
In two long strings of jelly in shallow water, thousands at a time.
As long double strands on the bottom or entwined in plants, 2,000 to 20,000 eggs.
Places where you might see it
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Watch
Country
United States
The United States is a large country in North America made of 50 states, from icy Alaska to the warm islands of Hawaii. It has the Grand Canyon, the Mississippi River and Yellowstone, and about 342 million people live there.
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Watch
Country
Canada
Canada is the second-largest country in the world, stretching across the north of North America from the Atlantic to the Pacific and up into the Arctic. It has the Rocky Mountains, thousands of islands and about 42 million people, who speak English, French and many other languages.
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Common toad
The common toad is a warty brown amphibian that lives across Europe and into Asia. It spends most of the year on land, hunting slugs, worms and insects at night, then travels back to the pond where it hatched to lay long strings of eggs each spring.
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Watch
Country
United States
The United States is a large country in North America made of 50 states, from icy Alaska to the warm islands of Hawaii. It has the Grand Canyon, the Mississippi River and Yellowstone, and about 342 million people live there.
-
Watch
Country
Canada
Canada is the second-largest country in the world, stretching across the north of North America from the Atlantic to the Pacific and up into the Arctic. It has the Rocky Mountains, thousands of islands and about 42 million people, who speak English, French and many other languages.
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The spring peeper is a tiny treefrog of eastern North America, about as long as a quarter is wide, with a dark X-shaped mark on its back. Early each spring, hundreds of males gather at small ponds and fill the night with high "peep" calls, one of the first signs that winter is over.
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Panamanian golden frog
The Panamanian golden frog is a small, bright yellow toad with black patches from the forest streams of Panama. Males wave their arms to talk to each other. A disease caused by the chytrid fungus wiped out the wild frogs, and none has been seen in the wild since 2009, so zoos and scientists are caring for golden frogs and working to return them to nature one day.
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The wood frog is a brown forest frog with a dark "robber's mask" across its eyes. It lives farther north than any other North American amphibian, reaching Alaska and northern Canada. To survive winter it lets much of its body freeze, protected by sugar in its cells, and in early spring it is one of the first frogs to call, with a sound like quacking ducks.
For parents & teachers
What children will learn
- Identify an American toad and its parotoid glands, ridges and warts.
- Describe the American toad life cycle and metamorphosis.
- Recognize the American toad's spring trill.
- Understand how toads help gardens and what they need to thrive.
Recommended ages: 3 to 17 · About 15 minutes
Talk about it
- Why might a toad's poison work better as a bad taste than as a bite?
- Where do you think toads hide in your neighborhood during the day?
- How could a garden or schoolyard be made friendlier for toads?
Try at home or in class
- Play the toad recording on this page and time one trill with a stopwatch. How long can you hum without stopping?
- With an adult, look under an outdoor light on a warm summer evening for toads waiting for insects. Watch quietly, and wash your hands if you touch one.
Key vocabulary: parotoid gland, trill, toadlet, metamorphosis, hibernate, wart
Where these facts come from
- The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species , International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN terms of use (no redistribution of Red List data or range maps))
- GBIF Backbone Taxonomy and GBIF Occurrence Search , Global Biodiversity Information Facility (CC0 1.0 (backbone); occurrence counts are facts derived from records under CC0, CC BY and CC BY-NC)
- Wikimedia Commons , Wikimedia Foundation (Per file: Public domain, CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA only (credited on each page))
- Anaxyrus americanus (American Toad), IUCN Red List assessment 2022 , IUCN
- American Toad , Missouri Department of Conservation
- Eastern American Toad Fact Sheet (Signs of the Seasons) , University of Maine Cooperative Extension
- Anaxyrus americanus (American Toad) , Animal Diversity Web, University of Michigan Museum of Zoology
- Frog life cycle, from egg to adult , Australian Museum
- Wikidata , Wikimedia Foundation (CC0 1.0)
Checked, not yet human-reviewed. Last updated October 27, 2026. Spotted a mistake? Tell us.