Swear to God...

If they're not losing their hair in patches, puking on the one piece of carpet in the entire house or devouring my ammo, they're still up to something.

Tonight? Tonight Sparky licked a freakin' toad.

We were standing out back, enjoying a smoke and noting that perhaps we should do something about mowing the back yard. Out of nowhere, Sparky comes racing into the light, shaking his head and snorting. Closer inspection revealed mouth foamage, so he went in the house for an intensive mouth wash (and fur-around-mouth wash with soap).

[sigh]

He seems to be fine, although I believe I should be monitoring his little pulse.

Once we washed his little mouth out, I trudged out with the flashlight and camera, in case we find outselves in doggy ER at 0330 trying to figure out the appropriate antivenin.

This is the Evil Toad.



I think what we have is a Woodhouse's Toad - Bufo woodhousii. It's too small and out of range to be a cane toad, and the most striking marking was the stripe on its back.

In good news, it appears that if the toad was going to be the death of the Yorkie, he'd be convulsing or panting by now. In bad news, I can assume I'm going to spend half the night checking his heartrate...