Bufo quercicus 131 



ENEMIES 



In 191 2 we wrote that the common garter snake ("highland moccasin") 

 prefers toads, and the oak toad with the Southern toad receives more of its 

 attention than any other prey. 



In 1922 we felt that the spreading adder (Heterodon) is equally appre- 

 ciative of oak toads as well as southern toads. The gopher frog has also been 

 given as inordinately fond of oak toads. 



AUTUMNAL DISAPPEARANCE 



Our first record for the swamp is April 25 about the earliest we entered the 

 swamp and our latest date August 26, 1922. After our 1912 trip we received 

 specimens of this species collected from July 1 5 to November i , but there is no 

 certainty they were taken at the latter date though we suspect it near the 

 period of the oak toad's retirement. We find in literature no record beyond 

 our August 26 though it must stay out for two or three months beyond this 

 date. 



AFFINITIES 



Holbrook who describes it spends most of this phase of his description to 

 proving it is not the young of a large species. "That this little animal is not 

 the young of any other species I am certain, for 



"i. It cannot be the young of the Bufo lentiginosus, for the superciliary 

 ridges are not elevated in proportion, the upper jaw is not emarginate, 

 and with the young of that species I am well acquainted. 

 "2. It cannot be the young of the Bufo americanus, as that animal is not 

 found near Charleston, and, besides, it wants the characteristic spade- 

 like process to the foot. 

 "3. It cannot be the young of the Bufo erithronotus, for its whole form is 

 different. It is not half the size, nor are its toes half as extensively 

 webbed; it is, in fact, a distinct and adult animal, for I have seen the 

 male and female together, and have seen the female deposit her spawn, 

 even when confined in a glass vessel". 

 It is a natural tendency to wonder if it be not a young of some other Bufo 

 when one first encounters it but it is very distinct as comparisons of an adult 

 B. quercicus and a young of Bufo lentiginosus reveal in the plate given (Plate 

 fig. 00). 



LeConte did not make any mistake about it but Cope made it a new form, 

 Chilophryne dialopha. Boulenger (1882, pp. 319, 309) retained Cope's Bufo 

 dialophus of Sandwich Islands (p. 319) and places Bufo quercicus Holbrook in 

 the synonymy of Bufo lentiginosus americanus. Cope led him astray and he, 

 Cope, (1889, p. 292) alludes to it thus "The redescription of the species by 

 myself was due to the omission of its characteristic peculiarities from extant 

 writings. The erroneous locality (Sandwich Islands) is one of the several 

 such errors, based on the incorrect labehng of the collections of J. H. Town- 

 send, to which the specimen belonged." 



