A toad lunged at me while I was weeding our bean patch, and the encounter startled both of us.
A toad was the last creature I expected to see in our garden, because except for a puddle or two, there's no water on the property, and toads require places with vegetation in close proximity to water for breeding purposes. And in the decades that I've lived on the property, I've only seen toads twice before.
The eastern American toad (Bufo a. americanus) left in a hurry. After all, I'm a giant by comparison to its overall length of 4 inches, and a potential predator.
I let it go, though. In fact, I even coaxed it with my weeder to where there was permanent cover. It's welcome to stay, you see, since toads can consume several times their weight in insect pests every day. Favorite snacks include slugs and moths.
This type of toad can live for up to 30 years, especially when kept as protected pets. But they also extend their lives by hibernating during cold-weather months beneath rocks, logs and litter, if they aren't eaten first by snakes, carnivorous mammals or birds.
Their brown, rust or olive coloration causes them to perfectly blend into their surroundings. So if this toad hadn't jumped when I approached, I never would have noticed it, even though I was practically on top of it. But toads are programmed to take flight as soon as they sense trouble, a fact that Aesop realized and wrote about.
'The frog and the hares'
Aesop, the Greek storyteller who wrote children's fables during the 6th century B.C., wrote one entitled "The Frogs and the Hares." In it, rabbits take flight and jump into a pond, determined to kill themselves rather than be trampled to death by stampeding horses.
The panicked rabbits caused the frogs living in the pond to leap for their lives out of the pond. According to Aesop, then, even rabbits are braver than toads.
So I suppose that settles it. I'm braver than a toad. At least I man up and don't run off when I encounter them, instead of taking flight like a frightened rabbit.
This week in the garden
It's sad yet unavoidable. Tomatoes split their skins when they receive too much water. Even crack-resistant varieties are no match for successive rainfall deluges.