Frogs vs. Toads Frogs and toads are “small, tailless animal” that belongs to the amphibian class. (Forester 536 & Gibbons 303) Everyone thinks that frogs and toads are different from one another but in fact “there is no clear distinction between” them (Burnie & Wilson 440). Most people find it very difficult to differentiate between a frog and a toad that they often mix them up. Their physical features are very much alike but they are different on the basis of anatomy and habitat.
When you see a creature hopping along the side of the creek, can you tell if it’s a frog or a toad? Frogs are very unique because “some frogs have colorful markings” (Forester 536). While as toads are marked in a “drab shades of brown, tan, gray, or black that serves as camouflage” (Campbell 217). Besides their markings, “almost all frogs have the same basic body structure” (Forester 536). Frogs have “long, powerful hind legs, which they use for jumping” (Forester 536). “Frogs can leap long distances, but also use their limbs to swim, burrow, and even to glide from tree to tree” (Wake 337). Unlike frogs, toads “generally have squat bodies and short legs” (Campbell 217). They do not “jump” like frogs so they “make short hops or even walk” (Campbell 217). As opposed to skin, frogs have “thin, moist skin” (Forester 536) and “the skin of most toads is dry, rough, and covered with warts” (Gibbons 303). There is an advantage to a toad’s dry skin. It’s “warty skin allows it to inhabit drier regions than does a frog” (Campbell 217).
On the other hand, frogs and toads are both born in the water but when they reach adult life, “frogs live on diverse habitats” (Wake 336), while as toads “spend most of their adult life on land” (Gibbons 304). Diverse habitat means that “frogs are widely distributed from lowland tropics to high mountains and high latitudes and from very wet to seasonally dry