DRIVERS are being urged to avoid a road where volunteers rescued around 500 toads on one night.

Despite the nightly efforts of the Ringwood Toad Patrol, some toads have still been squashed by careless drivers.

The mild but wet weather over recent nights has produced the ideal conditions for toads to migrate across a field, heading for the gravel lakes in the area of Gorley Road.

Toad patrol volunteers picked up around 100 of the amphibians on Wednesday night and around 500 on Thursday, said organiser Teresa Baker, and were expecting to pick up hundreds more last night.

“We want to request that drivers avoid the road because they will be held up,” she said. “We are patrolling. We do have to stop and get out. If you want to get home fast, don’t use the Gorley Road.”

Drivers that do use the route are being asked to drive cautiously and heed the warning signs to avoid squashing toads.

Toads will only cross the road between dusk and dawn and when the temperature is above five degrees celsius. They normally travel back to where they were born in order to spawn, between January and April.

Toads have been spawning earlier during the recent mild winters. But this year’s harsh weather has led them to spawn later, more in line with their normal behaviour.

“In the UK there are 750 crossing sites which have been registered in the last 25 years and this particular site is one of the most important,” said Teresa.

The volunteers have thanked drivers who have driven cautiously during the spawning season.

Anyone who would like to join the patrols should call 01425 478891.