TOAD

This guy appeared on my garden lawn and stayed immobile for some time.  Then he was gone.  We have a walled garden so how did he get in and where is he now?  Maybe he's been living in the garden for some time; toads usually find or make themselves a little resting place out of sight, a shady den, which they return to after each night's hunting.

You can tell he is a toad rather than a frog because his skin is dry and warty whereas a frog has smooth, moist skin.  Frogs tend to jump while toads crawl and occasionally hop a bit.   The warty bits, and especially the parotid gland, the swelling behind each eye, exude an acrid fluid when the toad feels in danger.  This puts off many predators.

Toads are more 'of the earth' than water loving frogs.  In fact I was once clearing up spilt clods of earth at the end of a gardening session when one of the clods wriggled and covered my hand in liquid.  I nearly jumped out of my skin; I had mistaken a fat brown toad for a clod of earth.

Toads spend even more time out of the water than frogs, feasting on beetles, caterpillars, flies, snails, worms, woodlice and even small mice and voles.  

An important part of the web of life.