Colorado River toad
| Colorado River toad | |
|---|---|
Secure (NatureServe) | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Amphibia |
| Order: | Anura |
| Family: | Bufonidae |
| Genus: | Incilius |
| Species: | I. alvarius
|
| Binomial name | |
| Incilius alvarius (Girard, 1859)
| |
| Synonyms | |
| |
The Colorado River toad (Incilius alvarius), (previously Bufo alvarius) also known as the Sonoran Desert toad, is a toad species found in northwestern Mexico and the southwestern United States. It is well known for its ability to exude toxins from glands within its skin that have psychoactive properties.
The toad's scientific name used to be Bufo alvarius, the name for which the toad is generally colloquially still known as. In the early 2000s, the increasingly important role of molecular genetic techniques in taxonomy and their ability to examine phylogenetic relationships allowed scientists to discover numerous distinct genera within the old Bufo group.
The Colorado River toad's name was subsequently changed to Incilius alvarius.