The Ecology Research Group is one of the UK's leading centres of amphibian research. The Ecology Research Group has also worked on Great Crested Newts and carried out the National Amphibian Survey for English Nature in the early 1990s. The effects of fertiliser on the common frog This work was started by English Nature, as a result of sightings of frogs suffering crossing fertilised field. It has established the acute toxic effect fertilisers have on adult frogs.
Fertilisers generally dissolve very quickly, so reducing the chances of harm to the frogs.
Investigations into the effects of fertilisers, and particularly the nitrate ion are underway on tadpoles, to see if high nitrate levels in ponds can cause a problem. The toad is a fairly common animal, even so a proper understanding of what it eats is not known. That said, once its diet is known, we need a way of comparing different habitats, so that their importance for toad feeding can be understood. This work hopes to answer these questions by looking at what toads eat, and what food is available in different habitats. The population dynamics of the common toad This study has been going on for many years at a site in Leicestershire.