Team Info
About The Team Name
Many criteria went into the decision making process of naming the team the Toledo Bullfrogs, including but not limited to the following:
- Will appeal to all age groups (men, women & children)
- Unique name - one of a kind
- There is a historical connection between the name and the region
- Logos can be easily embroidered and screen-printed for merchandise
- Can be easily spelled and understood when spoken
- Name should include city name (Toledo) for regional and national identification
- Mascot names and characters can be developed from name
- Team colors are different from regional professional and major collegiate teams
Bullfrog Fun Facts
- The American Bullfrog (Rana catesbeiana) is an aquatic frog, a member of the family Ranidae, or "true frogs", native to much of North America. This is a frog of larger, permanent water bodies, swamps, ponds, lakes, where it is usually found along the water's edge. On warm rainy nights, bullfrogs along with many other amphibians, go overland and may be seen in numbers on country roads.
- The bullfrog is the largest of the North American ranids, reaching a body length of 7.9 inches, and can weigh up to 1.7 lb. Females are typically larger than males. Bullfrogs are generally varying shades of green or brown. The head is usually mostly green. The body varies from olive to brown, and may be darkly blotched or spotted.
- Ranid frogs absorb oxygen and eliminate carbon dioxide through their moist skin, the lining of the mouth, and the lungs. When in the air, as opposed to underwater, frogs continuously elevate and lower the floor of the mouth, which serves to ventilate the mouth, or buccal cavity, and exchange gases through the richly vascularized lining of the mouth. Periodically, the regular rhythmic pumping of the floor of the mouth is interrupted by a deeper lowering of the throat at the extreme of which the glottis opens and the throat muscles contract vigorously to force air from the mouth into the lungsÑthe nostrils are closed off. This lung ventilation may be performed several times after which the shallow buccal ventilation resumes. Lacking ribs, frogs must supply the pressure to force air into their lungs, whereas mammals can enlarge the cavity surrounded by the rigid rib cage and allow the atmosphere to supply the pressure.
- Frog eggs hatch in 3-5 days. Time to metamorphosis ranges from a few months in the southern to 3 years in the northern parts of the geographic range.
- Maximum lifespan in the wild is estimated at 8-10 years, but a captive frog has lived to 16 years.
- Stomach content studies going back to 1913 suggest the bullfrog preys on any animal it can overpower and stuff down its throat. Bullfrog stomachs have been found to contain rodents, small turtles, snakes, frogs including bullfrogs, birds, even a bat, as well as the many invertebrates which are the usual food of ranid frogs.
- These studies furthermore reveal the bullfrog's diet to be unique among North American Rana in the inclusion of large percentages of aquatic animals, e.g., fish, tadpoles, Planorbid snails, Dytiscid beetles.
- The bullfrog, like many other ranid frogs, is an ambush predator. At a chosen site, the visually vigilant frog waits relatively motionless until prey appears and elicits its feeding behavior.
- Prey motion elicits feeding behavior. First, if necessary, the frog performs a single orienting bodily rotation ending with the frog aimed towards the prey. This is followed by approaching leaps, if necessary. Once within striking distance, the bullfrog emits its feeding strike, which consists of a ballistic (eyes closed as during all leaps) lunge that ends with the mouth opening, extension of the fleshy and mucous-coated tongue upon the prey, often engulfing it, while the jaws continue their forward travel to close (bite) in close proximity to the prey's original location just as the tongue is retracted back into the mouth, prey attached.
- Large prey that do not travel entirely into the mouth are literally stuffed in with the forearms. In laboratory observations, bullfrogs taking mice usually dove underwater with prey in mouth, apparently with the advantageous result of altering the mouse's defense from counterattack to struggling for air. The tiny teeth of bullfrogs are useful only in grasping. Asphyxiation is the most likely cause of death of endothermic (warm-blooded) bullfrog prey.
