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(whooshing sound)

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- [Announcer] The federally
endangered Houston Toad

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lives in three central TxDOT districts.

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When road construction projects
are underway in those areas,

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specially-designed toad exclusion fences

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are used as part of the effort

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to make sure the Houston Toad
can't enter those work zones.

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Researchers with Texas Agrilife Research

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and Texas A&M Transportation Institute

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developed unique ways to
study the fencing system.

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- The project was the
assessment of our AREF,

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or amphibian and reptile exclusion fence.

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TxDOT had started some years ago

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with what we called toad
exclusion Fence, TEF,

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but in this project and in the evolution,

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we've expanded it to be focused
not just on Houston Toads.

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It's been expanded now for statewide use,

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including development of a specification

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of this amphibian reptile exclusion fence.

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- We're testing three
different types of fences,

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including the TxDOT amphibian
and reptile exclusion fence,

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as well as two commercially
available fences.

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And so we built this arena

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with several different configurations

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of these three types of fencing.

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We have some barrier
kind of configurations

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to see if the toads can escape

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out of a barrier configuration.

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And we have jump out configurations

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in which the toads are
supposed to be able to escape.

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In the field, this would
mean that the barrier

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would be around a construction zone,

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so toads could not actually get

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into those construction zones,

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and if they were in the construction zone,

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we'd want the jump out configuration

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to allow them to escape.

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- Our expertise is in materials.

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You know, we traditionally test materials

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for erosion and settlement control

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and so with our expertise
in installing materials,

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that's what we did for this project.

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We were responsible for
installing, maintaining

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and then removing the materials
once the study was finished.

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- We decided to use the Gulf
Coast Toad as a proxy species

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so that we would not be
handling Houston Toads.

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So we use the proxy species,
a very common species

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called the Gulf Coast
Toad, incilius nebulifer,

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and we collected a bunch of them

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and ran about 10 cohorts of
18 toads and they experienced

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each of the six different configurations,

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so three fences, barrier and jump out,

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so that's six configurations.

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- The concept is to exclude Houston Toads

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from construction areas.

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So we go in, we survey ahead of time,

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we put down this barrier,
the exclusion fence,

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and then it's a safe work zone

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without having to constantly monitor

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and pay attention to the Houston Toads.

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- Our results are not final,
but we've found so far

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that the TxDOT amphibian
and reptile exclusion fence

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was designed appropriately.

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It does exclude toads and
it works as a barrier.

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- The benefit that this project does

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is it's validated what was a TxDOT method.

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It's compared it to some of the other

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commercially available products
and shown its effectiveness,

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both in excluding snakes and toads from.