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Walking Canes
Invasive toads prone to debilitating arthritis infections
©Eric Delmar/iStock.comBrown, G.P. et al. 2007. Invasion, stress, and spinal arthritis in cane toads. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 104(45):17698-17700.
Since their first introduction to northern Queensland in 1935, cane toads (Chaunus marinus) have hopped across more than 1 million square kilometers of the Australian landscape. Carnage has followed the invasion, as native animals have fallen prey to the toads’ voracious appetites and naïve predators have succumbed to their toxic defenses. Control efforts have had little success, but according to research recently published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, there could be a chink in the alien’s armor. Remarkably, many toads at the invasion front have bad backs.
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