NT: Traps could slow cane toad march: NT govt

AAP General News (Australia)
02-16-2005
NT: Traps could slow cane toad march: NT govt

DARWIN, Feb 16 AAP - The Northern Territory is stepping up its war on deadly cane toads
as they close in on Darwin.

Parks and Wildlife Minister Chris Burns today announced a $422,000 grant to community-based
Frogwatch, to help set supertraps to slow the toads' march north.

The warty creatures are expected to arrive in Darwin this wet season.

"The focus of the Frogwatch grant will be what they're calling `toad musters'," Mr Burns said.

"They've trialled a supertrap that's shown itself to be fairly effective in reducing
toad numbers, particularly in sensitive areas."

The government hopes the traps, which show a 90 per cent success rate, will slow the
cane toad's spread.

"As we come into dry season now, the toad numbers will concentrate around existing
waterways and billabongs," Mr Burns said.

"I think Frogwatch intend to set the traps around there and really give the toads a
pasting around those strategic areas.

"It's like a war. It has to be fought strategically."

Cane toads have spread across Australia from Queensland, where they were introduced
in the 1930s to kill pest in the cane fields, to northern NSW, and into the NT.

They have decimated wildlife - particularly goannas, snakes and other reptiles - which
die after eating the poisonous toads.

The grant brings the NT government's fight against the toads' to $1.1 million.

It has written to the federal government asking that it match today's grant.

AAP km/evt/jlw

KEYWORD: TOADS

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