CHANGES IN BREEDING SITE FIDELITY - A COMBINED STUDY OF CONSERVATION AND BEHAVIOR IN THE COMMON TOAD BUFO-BUFO

One potential measure to counteract road mortality of common toads Bufo bufo is the establishment of populations at artificially created ponds by translocating adults' This is thought to be difficult because of this species' strong site fidelity. We describe here a successful resettlement of a substitute breeding pond in Northern Germany (Lower Saxony). We first created a barrier system made of used metal vehicle crash barriers which successfully prevented toads from crossing a road to reach a breeding pond. The toads were collected annually in pitfall traps and transferred to the substitute breeding pond. A majority of the adult population of common toads became attached to the substitute breeding pond after only two to three years. The migration directed at the old breeding site dropped to approximately 15% after four years and subsequently to less than 1%. Our findings show that the provision of substitute breeding ponds can be a useful measure for the protection of amphibians.