In Peru's Cerros de Amotape National Park, toads appear to have dressed up for Halloween. But this image, captured by a park ranger, does not show a new species of "bat toad": it is an ordinary cane toad that has captured a bat.
He is about to end up run over, his mother saves him
In Peru's Cerros de Amotape National Park, toads appear to have dressed up for Halloween. But this image, captured by a park ranger, does not show a new species of "bat toad": this is a normal cane toad that has caught a bat.
The photo was published by the naturalist Phil Torres on the blog of the Rainforest Expeditions. In the post, Torres notes that the cane toad is a "notoriously opportunistic eater ". Apparently, the bat was flying too close to the ground and was caught.
Out of nowhere the bat is flown directly into the toad's mouth, who seemed to be sitting with his mouth wide open. After struggling with the meal for quite some time, the toad eventually gave up on the meal that came down from the sky and spat it out because it was too big for his mouth. The bat recovered fairly quickly from the accident and flew away shortly after.
"We've heard a lot of bizarre things while working in the Peruvian rainforests, but this is the strangest power interaction I have ever seen." said Torres. Since he posted the image, the naturalist has received many messages from biologists they have seen other bats eaten in an unusual way, one from a large frog in Costa Rica and another from a woodpecker in Texas, for example.
“These kinds of unexpected interactions between species probably happen much more often than we think, it's just that we don't always have the good fortune to have a camera alongside to capture the moment,” concludes Torres.
Roberta Ragni
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