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Bufo boreas halophilus - California Toad

Two toads at water dish getting crickets that fall in water.

Overhead view of their tank. The tank contains four inches of clean topsoil with an inch of orchid moss over that. Water crystals are mixed into the soil and moss to keep it moist without being dank or soggy.

Four of them; moved hide to show them.

The other three.

Toads hanging out on log.

Toads in hand.

I have had these toads starting in early April. How this project began is my California king snake's tank got cracked and I moved the snake into a new tub. Then I got a piece of Plexiglas and replaced the broken pane. But what to put in it, since the snake was already in new quarters and seemed to be happy with that. I was doing yard work and as I moved lumber and rocks around I kept finding these little toads, and decided to keep them, as their husbandry is pretty simple. Since they have been in this tank, some for over a month and others more recently, they have grown incredibly fast on crickets. I also put earthworms in there. It's a good thing I raise crickets, as toads eat a lot! This tank sits on my coffee table and is quite entertaining, as the toads come out and walk around, take swims, and hunt crickets. They soon learn I am not a threat and let me watch them for hours. I do plan on getting a much bigger tank just for them in the near future.

Toad tub

Toad tub with lid on.

Toads inside log hide. Ten toads live in this tub. I guess captive life agrees with them, as they are all many times bigger now than they were early this spring when I gathered them.
The lid will eventually go on the box I plan to build for them, with 1 x 12 inch lumber and lined with heavy duty plastic to protect the wooden bottom.

They like to burrow in the evening so I want to give them a nice deep box of at least 6 inches soil; now they have about three inches, which will do for the summer.
I am using just plain top soil with no fertilizers or other additives for them. As they poop up the soil it is recycled into the garden. The water bowl has to be changed at least once a day as they like to soak in it and poop in it. The egg crate piece is loaded with crickets, and cricket food and water crystals for the crickets. This is sort of a toad buffet, which the toads visit throughout the day.

I like that garden plan!
Those of us in apartments don't have that option without jumping through hoops that I'm usually too lazy for, so I favor less bacterial-friendly sunstrates that I can use for a much longer time before they end up adding to the landfill situation. I've mentioned to you eleswhere what my system is. But that's me. Because I have no real use for a constant supply of nitrogen-rich soil. For your own situation, this is way better!
Do you get any composting use out of your snake shavings as well?
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0.1 2006 Western Hognose (Bebe)
0.1 age unknown Cane Toad (Hengo)
0.1 2005 White-Banded Sheen Skink (Minerva)
1.0 2006 Northern Diamondback Terrapin (Queequeg)
1.0 2006 Madagascan Speckled "Hognose" (Sigmund)
1.0 2008 Bullsnake (Winkle)
1.2 2008 Eastern Collared Lizards (Pancho, Lupe, and Chica)
2.0 2009 Eastern Collared Lizards (Cesar and Nino)

I not only get use out of my snake aspen shavings and the snake poop, I raise my own mice on pine shavings and crickets on vermiculite and that generates a considerable amount of litter for the compost heap. My operation would not work for city folks, though. I am in a rural area surrounded by forest with only one neighbor several hundred feet away. So there is no one to be bothered by my hobbies.

A funny story; for awhile many years ago I temporarily had to live in an apartment while looking for rural land to buy, and during that time had a very difficult time with compostable garbage. It just bothered the devil out of me to have to throw it in the regular trash instead of composting it! At that time I did not have dozens of animals and their wastes as well. The very first thing I did once I had land again was build a compost bin; you might say I have a compostive-obsessive personality! LOL!