THE CENTER FOR NORTH AMERICAN HERPETOLOGY

Amphibia    Anura    Bufonidae  

Texas Toad
Anaxyrus speciosus (Girard, 1854)
AH-naks-EE-rus — spee-see-OH-sus

SSAR 9th Edition Comments:
 There are no current SSAR comments for this taxon.

Range maps are based on curated specimens and provided gratis by CNAH.
(Created by Travis W. Taggart; Version: 2024.09.06.08.31.42)
Download GeoJSON polygon range file: - 0.37 MB

Province/State Distribution:
United States: New Mexico Oklahoma Texas

Taxonomic Etymology:
The name combines a Greek-derived genus name with a Latin species epithet describing appearance:
Anaxyrus — From Greek: ἀνάξ (anax) = “lord” or “king”. Anaxyrus means “noble toad” or “lordly toad,” reflecting its prominent place among North American toads.
specious — From Latin: speciosus = “showy,” “beautiful,” or “handsome” This refers to the toad’s striking or attractive appearance compared to other species.

First instance(s) of published English names:
Western Toad (Bufo speciosus: Yarrow, Henry C. 1882. Check list of North American Reptilia and Batrachia with catalogue of specimens in U. S. National Museum. Bulletin of the United States National Museum (24):1-249); Spadefoot Toad (: Strecker, John K., Jr. 1915. Reptiles and amphibians of Texas. Baylor University Bulletin 18(4):29952); Spadefoot Toad (Bufo compactilis: Strecker, John K., Jr. 1922. An annotated catalogue of the amphibians and reptiles of Bexar County, Texas. Bulletin Scientific Society of San Antonio (4):1-31); Sonoran Toad (: Slevin, Joseph R. 1928. The amphibians of western North America. Occasional Papers of the California Academy of Sciences 16():1-152); Spade-footed Toad (: Wright, Anna Allen, and Alex Hazen Wright. 1933. Handbook of frogs and toads. The frogs and toads of the United States and Canada Comstock Publishing Associates, Ithaca, NY. xi+231pp.); Spadefoot Toad (Bufo compactilis: Wright, Anna Allen, and Alex Hazen Wright. 1933. Handbook of frogs and toads. The frogs and toads of the United States and Canada Comstock Publishing Associates, Ithaca, NY. xi+231pp.); Western Toad (Bufo compactilis: Wright, Anna Allen, and Alex Hazen Wright. 1933. Handbook of frogs and toads. The frogs and toads of the United States and Canada Comstock Publishing Associates, Ithaca, NY. xi+231pp.); Spade-footed Toad (Bufo compactilis: Wright, Anna Allen, and Alex Hazen Wright. 1933. Handbook of frogs and toads. The frogs and toads of the United States and Canada Comstock Publishing Associates, Ithaca, NY. xi+231pp.); Sonoran Toad (Bufo compactilis: Wright, Anna Allen, and Alex Hazen Wright. 1933. Handbook of frogs and toads. The frogs and toads of the United States and Canada Comstock Publishing Associates, Ithaca, NY. xi+231pp.); Desert Toad (Bufo compactilis: Bragg, Arthur N. and Charles Clinton Smith. 1943. Observations on the ecology and natural history of anura IV: The ecological distribution of toads in Oklahoma. Ecology 24(3):285-309); Sonora Toad (Bufo compactilis: Schmidt, Karl P. 1953. A Check List of North American Amphibians and Reptiles. 6th Edition. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois. 280pp.); Northern Sonora Toad (Bufo compactilis speciosus: Schmidt, Karl P. 1953. A Check List of North American Amphibians and Reptiles. 6th Edition. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois. 280pp.); Texas Toad (Bufo compactilis: Conant, Roger, Fred R. Cagle, Coleman J. Goin, Charles H. Lowe, Wilfred T. Neill, M. Graham Netting, Karl P. Schmidt, Charles E. Shaw, Robert C. Stebbins, and Charles M. Bogert. 1956. Common names for North American amphibians and reptiles. Copeia 1956(3):172-185); Texas Toad (Anaxyrus speciosus: Frost, Darrel R., Roy W. McDiarmid, Joseph R. Mendelson III, and David M. Green. 2012. Anura - Frogs. Pages 11-22 in Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles, Herpetological Circular No. 39. pp.);

Taxon Links:

  
Catalog of American Amphibians and Reptiles
  
Amphibian Species of the World
  
NatureServe
  
iNaturalist
  
GenBank
  
USGS - Nonindigenous Aquatic Species Database

Selected References:
1854 Girard, Charles. A list of the North American Bufonids, with diagnoses of new species. Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia 7:86-88
1939 Bragg, Arthur N. and R. E. Kuntz. Bufo compactilis Wiegmann, a new toad for Oklahoma. Proceedings of the Oklahoma Academy of Science 20:77
1947 Smith, Hobart M. Subspecies of the Sonoran toad (Bufo compactilis Wiegmann). Herpetologica 4(1):7-13
1959 Baldauf, Richard J. Morphological criteria and their use in showing bufonid phylogeny. Journal of Morphology 104(3):527-560.
1962 Tihen, Joseph A. A review of new world fossil bufonids. The American Midland Naturalist 68(1):1-50
1972 Rogers, J. S. Discriminate function analysis of morphological relationships within the Bufo cognatus species group. 1972(2):381-383
2004 Pauly, Gregory B., David M. Hillis, and David C. Cannatella. The history of a Nearctic colonization: Molecular phylogenetics and biogeography of the Nearctic toads (Bufo). Evolution 58:2517-2535
2005 Lannoo, Michael (Editor) Amphibian Declines: The Conservation Status of United States Species. University fo California Press, Berkeley. 1115pp.
2008 Pauly, Gregory B. Phylogenetic systematics, historical biogeography, and the evolution of vocalizations in Nearctic toads (Bufo). Dissertation. University of Texas, Austin. 165pp.
2013 Dodd, C. Kenneth. Frogs of the United States and Canada. John Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, Maryland. 982pp.
2016 Peralta-Garcia, Anny, Dean H. Leavitt, Bradford D. Hollingsworth, and Tod W. Reeder. The phylogenetic position of the Little Mexican Toad, Anaxyrus kelloggi, using molecular data. Journal of Herpetology 50(3):471-475
2023 Dodd, C. Kenneth. Frogs of the United States and Canada. Second Edition. John Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, Maryland. 1032pp.

THE CENTER FOR NORTH AMERICAN HERPETOLOGY — Accessed: Wednesday 04 March 2026 00:17 CT