{"id":23575,"date":"2018-05-23T06:27:24","date_gmt":"2018-05-23T13:27:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/?p=23575"},"modified":"2018-05-25T23:02:39","modified_gmt":"2018-05-26T06:02:39","slug":"party-toads","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/?p=23575","title":{"rendered":"Party toads"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The Western Toad certainly knows how to throw an orgy. There were many dozen of them in the shallows mating promiscuously cheek by jowl.<\/p>\n<p>The mating technique of these toads is called amplexus. Amplexus\u00a0(Latin for <em>embrace<\/em>) is a type of external fertilization in which a male grasps a female with his front legs and fertilizes the eggs as they are released from her body.<\/p>\n<p>Three couples couple. Each male has grasped a female from above.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-23583\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/westerntoad180521bs.jpg\" alt=\"\" onclick=\"return false\" onmousedown=\"return false\" width=\"720\" height=\"480\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Sometimes mating takes place entirely underwater.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-23577\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/westerntoad180521gs.jpg\" alt=\"\" onclick=\"return false\" onmousedown=\"return false\" width=\"720\" height=\"480\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Sometimes\u00a0it takes place mainly out of water.\u00a0<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-23587\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/westerntoad180521is.jpg\" alt=\"\" onclick=\"return false\" onmousedown=\"return false\" width=\"720\" height=\"480\" \/><\/p>\n<p>And sometimes, it is a bit of each.\u00a0<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-23576\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/westerntoad180521hs.jpg\" alt=\"\" onclick=\"return false\" onmousedown=\"return false\" width=\"720\" height=\"480\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Strings of eggs can be seen extending from the mating couple.\u00a0<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-23579\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/westerntoad180521es.jpg\" alt=\"\" onclick=\"return false\" onmousedown=\"return false\" width=\"720\" height=\"480\" \/><\/p>\n<p>It seems that there is often conflict. Here is an idyllic scene, but&#8230;\u00a0<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-23581\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/westerntoad180521cs.jpg\" alt=\"\" onclick=\"return false\" onmousedown=\"return false\" width=\"720\" height=\"480\" \/><\/p>\n<p>when an interloper tries to take the male&#8217;s place, it is kicked away.\u00a0<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-23580\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/westerntoad180521ds.jpg\" alt=\"\" onclick=\"return false\" onmousedown=\"return false\" width=\"720\" height=\"480\" \/><\/p>\n<p>There are two mating couples here.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-23578\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/westerntoad180521fs.jpg\" alt=\"\" onclick=\"return false\" onmousedown=\"return false\" width=\"720\" height=\"480\" \/><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This has been a good orgy. Let&#8217;s do it again some time.&#8221;\u00a0<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-23582\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/westerntoad180521as.jpg\" alt=\"\" onclick=\"return false\" onmousedown=\"return false\" width=\"720\" height=\"480\" \/><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; The Western Toad certainly knows how to throw an orgy. There were many dozen of them in the shallows mating promiscuously cheek by jowl. The mating technique of these toads is called amplexus. Amplexus\u00a0(Latin for embrace) is a type &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/?p=23575\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23575","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-herptiles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23575","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23575"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23575\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23614,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23575\/revisions\/23614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}