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| THE COMMON ‘TREE TOAD | 
RICHARD DECKERT, New York Zoological Garden 
& Se a 
There are few people who have spent 
some time in the country, in the eastern 
United States who have not at one time 
or another come across this wonderfully 
interesting little chap. Perhaps, while 
inhaling the fragrance of some flowering 
vine, you haye seen a bluish green tree 
toad, sound asleep under cover of a 
clump of leaves. Another time you have 
been picking cherries, and climbing 
among the limbs, have put your hand on 
what looked like a brown or gray knob 
of some branch, to feel it wet and soft 
and to see it come to life. It is our Hyla, 
sleeping after a good meal of flies and 
beetles. In early October, while looking 
for the first ripe apple, we will sometimes 
come across him in the old orchard. He 
may be found on the white-painted gate 
post of a fence, himself almost white, 
and looking like a paint blister. His 
behavior is not like that of most frogs, 
particularly the Spring Peeper, Hyla 
pickeringit. He is fat, lazy and confident 
—not easily frightened, and when taken 
in hand will cling with his ten sticky toe- 
pads, so that it takes quite some force to 
disengage him. If the hand is turned up- 
side down, he will slowly climb around 
until again uppermost, then begin to tuck 
in his “arms and legs,” satisfied to remain 
on his living perch. 
All his actions can be summed up in 
the word “cute.” His color changes, 
while rather slow, can be wonderfully 
diverse. Pale yellowish white, whitish 
gray, without marks, or with the star on 
his shoulders faintly outlined with black, 
this star sometimes pale green or pink, 
he can assume almost any shade of gray, 
brown and green, from palest bluish 
green to grass green. 
The above mentioned more or less star- 
shaped mark on his shoulder, two broad 
longitudinal bars on the sides, two, some- 
times three cross bars on the arms and 
legs, and a V-shaped mark on the head 
between the eyes, are usually present 
when the tree toad assumes a medium or 
The Tree Toad 
Photograph from life by D. Franklin 
Hyla versicolor 
dark color. These marks may be absent 
or but faintly indicated when our tree 
toad is dressed in his paler hues. 
A white, chalky patch under the eye 
can always be distinguished, no matter 
what the color of the rest of the body. 
The under sides are grayish white with- 
out spots, the concealed surfaces of the 
hind legs are orange yellow, marbled with 
dark brown on the hinder sides of the 
thighs. The iris of the eye usually cor- 
responds with the color of the body, ex- 
cept when the latter is green. It then 
assumes a silvery or pale brassy hue. The 
upper parts are covered with even-sized, 
large, more or less prominent granules or 
warts. When the tree toad has been ex- 
