Agreement on toad protection: road course will be adapted for amphibians!

Agreement on toad protection: road course will be adapted for amphibians!

In a remarkable agreement between the Osnabrück district, the Nature Conservation Association (NABU) and local trout farmers, a compromise was reached that is intended to protect toad migration. This is reported by NDR. The Osnabrück Administrative Court had accompanied a trial in Bad Iburg, which initially decided against the planned road closure because the closing times had not been legally set by the district. The road closure in the “Kleiner Berg” nature reserve is now being implemented, albeit under changed conditions.

The district had already decided in January 2025 to close the road from February to the end of April from 6 p.m. to 8 a.m. in order to offer the amphibians safe routes during their migration. However, the trout farmers, represented by Frederik Dettmeyer, sued against this measure because they feared that they would not be able to serve their businesses adequately. The new compromise stipulates that the road will be closed with barriers next spring, but only for a shortened section. A barrier will be moved so that access to the trout farm remains possible for customers and suppliers. The district will test this solution for a year and monitor the number of animals protected.

Commitment to amphibian conservation

NABU sees this agreement as an important step in the fight to protect amphibians, which often fall victim to road traffic. Conservationists in Germany have been working for years to combat amphibian deaths on roads. In addition to setting up fences, carrying the toads across the street is also one of the activities that conservation groups carry out. Spawning migrations as well as further information about the cute amphibians can be found on the NABU homepage. No previous knowledge is required for those interested, as the protective measures, which usually last two to three months, are well organized.

An important innovation that NABU has introduced is an interactive database that contains information on protective fence locations. The organizers of protective fences can also independently enter and update their locations in the database. Over a thousand protective fences including contact addresses are listed here, and nature conservation groups are urgently looking for helpers who would like to support this important task.

The challenges of toad migration

Despite efforts to protect amphibians, the situation is often tense. Just in 2025, volunteers were able to save over 570 amphibians, but there were also cases of roadkill. These facts illustrate how important it is to protect migratory toads and the challenges that conservation groups overcome every day. While the commitment to crawling friends is increasing, the “Toad Ticker” with over 400 active groups shows that many people nationwide are committed to amphibious protection.

The efforts to protect toads and general amphibians are a valuable contribution to biodiversity in the region and show that with a good knack for dealing with nature conservation issues and deeper cooperation between business and environmentalists, solutions can be created that are viable for everyone involved.