Frog leather - Toad leather

Frog leather and toad leather

Frog and toad leathers are quite rare and used mainly for bags or other small objects. They have a wart-like surface, which is partly smoothed in production.

Typical, wart-like surface of the cane toad.

Bullfrog

Leather handbags from the skin of the bull frog are rarities - especially, when the head is incorporated.

Skin of the bullfrog.

Leather handbag made of bullfrog leather from about 1930. Head of the bullfrog with glass eyes.

Leather handbag made of bullfrog leather and bullfrog skin seen in the DLM - German Leather Museum in Offenbach.

Cane toad

Cane toads have been brought more than 60 years ago from their natural areas (South and Central America) to the Pacific region. It was planned to utilize the toad for biological pest control in all possible plantations (for example sugar cane or rice). However, the experiment has failed and was catastrophic for the local fauna. A single adult female can lay more than 30000 eggs under favourable conditions. The animals can reach a body length of more than 20 cm and a weight of over one kilo.

Due to the lack of natural enemies and diseases, the amount of cane toads has increased a lot. They are not selective and eat nearly everything. Besides most insects, they also eat other small animals (lizards, snakes and other amphibians) or little birds. Toads, which occupy huge amounts of natural or artificial waters (especially vestibules), can make the water totally useless for other animals.

Since they have been dragged in and developed into large pests, they have been officially fought as a plague for many years. The negative ecological consequences caused by their artificial settlement now serve as an example of the enormous risks of uncontrolled and unsupervised biological pest control.