[3] Quite how the toads sensed the quake is unclear, but a full 96 per cent of males scarpered, only to return a day after the danger was over.
The discovery baffled Dr.Rachel Grant, who hadn’t set out to discover toads’ reaction to earthquakes but to study the effect of the lunar cycle on them.
Now, however, she believes that they might be able to ‘detect pre-seismic clues, such as the release of gases and charged particles, and use these as a form earthquake early-warning system’
[4] Whether this discovery will change our affection for amphibians is debatable, but what is certain is that toads are not the only creatures credited with an uncanny power to predict natural disasters.