Exploding Toads

Badly Configured writes "The city of Hamburg in Germany is plagued by exploding amphibians (The Times, BBC, press release from the city, in German). People are warned not to go near the unstable animals for the fear of being hit. Experts have tested the toads for bacteria and chemicals, yet the reason for the animals going off remains a mystery..." From the article: "The toads' entrails are propelled for up to a metre (3.2ft), in scenes that have been likened to science fiction. Scientists are baffled. Possible explanations include a unknown virus or a fungus in the pond. "

Comments

Where's the video?

[MDMurphy]

I was hoping one of news services would have video. It would be best if there was one illustrating the suicide maneuver, startling a crow diving in for attack.

I like the theory of suicide, with one generation protecting the the future generations as all crows will from now on be scared off.

What we're really going to find is kids have been feeding them PopRocks at night.

Conversion factors and significant digits

[psetzer]

Yanno, mentioning that the guts were propelled 3.2 feet into the air sounds kinda like someone had nothing better to do than to measure the size of the splats with more precision than most people would consider sane. Now, I've had my suspicions about the Germans, but this is worse than anything I've previously read.