Toby meets a toad

I took Toby out for the usual Saturday morning walk around the yard. There happens to be a black toad living by the roses so I thought it would be fun to see how the curiosity of a cat behaves around this newly discovered creature. Toby loves to check out the critters who live in the yard, it's always entertaining.

As he approached the toad, Toby put out his paw to touch the creature, next thing I knew the cat was shaking his head from side-to-side while flinging his saliva everywhere. He was foaming at the mouth like a rabid dog. From trying to get rid of it, the foamy saliva was wrapped all around his head to where he looked like he was slimed like in Ghostbusters.

I immediately got some paper towels, wet them down and wiped all the saliva off the cat. He was pretty uncomfortable but he settled down once I cleaned off his tongue. I quickly googled the toad to discover that they shoot venom as protection from predators. The venom makes the victim uncomfortable, but is basically harmless in the long run. Well he was pretty uncomfortable all right.

I felt so bad that I could have harmed my little kitty. Toby is so friendly and harmless and I thought it would be fun to watch is gentle curiosity in action. Thank goodness he is OK.