The Fort Worth Zoo hopped at the opportunity to release over 700,000 endangered Houston toad tadpoles and eggs into their native range on a designated, protected release site in Bastrop County, according to a release.
This initiative is a result of a partnership the zoo has with Texas State University and the Houston Zoo for Houston toad recovery.
The zoo is one of only four facilities that breeds this specific species under managed care. This year’s toads have produced more eggs and tadpoles in a single year than the previous years combined since the program began in 2010 (2010-2022 total tadpoles and eggs: 665,813).
New to the process this year, a second Houston toad breeding facility was built behind the scenes that allowed the Fort Worth Zoo to double its capacity for this species, increasing the potential for breeding opportunities and larger egg and tadpole numbers.
The zoo also has a full-time reproductive physiologist on staff who determines when the females are ready to breed to maximize egg production. Each week, over the past eight weeks, the Fort Worth Zoo’s Houston toad team makes breeding matches based on the physiologist’s findings, counts every egg, bags the egg strands, and takes them down to the release site in Bastrop County. From each important genetic toad pairing, about 10 tadpoles remain at the Zoo and are added to the assurance population to keep a healthy variety of genetics for future toad breeding.
The Houston toad was one of the first amphibians to be listed in the Endangered Species Act in 1970. It is believed there are fewer than 400 toads left in the wild. Declines in the toad’s populations suggest that the balance of its ecosystem is off. When populations of one species start to decline, declines in other species may follow. The Houston toad is known as a “habitat specialist,” meaning it requires very specific environmental conditions for it to live and thrive. It needs thick, deep sandy soil as well as canopy cover, native grasses, and water sources for living and breeding.
Much of the forested long-leaf pine areas in which the toad lives have been converted for agricultural and commercial use, reducing the toad’s specialized habitat.
