Distribution:
The Plains Spadefoot is found in western Kansas to the edge of the Flint Hills, and east along the floodplain of the Kansas and Missouri rivers. It is seldom encountered except when chorusing or moving (often across roads) The Plains Spadefoot inhabits prairies and open floodplains. It prefers areas of loose soil or sand, into which during rainy weather it burrows during daylight hours and from which it emerges in the evening to forage, particularly after rain. In northeastern Kansas, Fitch (1958) found this species scarce in the wooded uplands of his study area and considered small mammal burrows to be their favored retreats. Plains Spadefoots are active from late April to September.
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• Occurrence Summary:  
• 1,976
  Records 
• 1,744
  Museum Vouchers 
• 232
  Other Observations 

Some county occurrences indicated below may be too imprecise to map above.
County Breakdown: County Name (# occurrences):
Atchison (3); Barber (86); Barton (33); Cheyenne (19); Clark (16); Clay (2); Cloud (2); Comanche (32); Cowley (7); Decatur (6); Dickinson (1); Doniphan (1); Douglas (221); Edwards (3); Ellis (130); Ellsworth (1); Finney (86); Ford (16); Geary (2); Gove (1); Graham (18); Grant (7); Gray (11); Greeley (5); Hamilton (9); Harper (36); Harvey (3); Haskell (7); Hodgeman (1); Jefferson (32); Jewell (3); Johnson (12); Kearney (12); Kingman (38); Kiowa (2); Lane (6); Leavenworth (2); Logan (40); Marion (1); Marshall (5); McPherson (19); Meade (82); Mitchell (7); Morton (159); Ness (27); Norton (1); Osborne (5); Ottawa (1); Pawnee (20); Phillips (10); Pottawatomie (15); Pratt (34); Rawlins (1); Reno (70); Rice (9); Riley (39); Rooks (7); Rush (161); Russell (10); Saline (4); Scott (30); Sedgwick (4); Seward (27); Shawnee (2); Sheridan (2); Sherman (53); Smith (2); Stafford (72); Stanton (2); Stevens (7); Sumner (5); Thomas (119); Trego (14); Unknown (2); Wabaunsee (3); Wallace (24); Washington (3); Wichita (2); Wyandotte (4);

Fossil History:
Pleistocene fossils of this species have been collected from McPherson and Meade counties.
Fossils from the Sandahl Local Fauna of McPherson County (Pleistocene: Illinoian) (Holman 1971; Preston 1979) are assignable to this taxon.

Natural History:
The Plains Spadefoot is an explosive and opportunistic breeder, emerging from its underground retreats for this purpose after the first warm, heavy spring rain and continuing to congregate under suitable conditions throughout the summer. Males loudly chorus for females to join them around temporary rain-pools on floodplains or open prairie. The male mounts a female, clasping her around the groin with his front limbs. The female deposits her eggs, and the male arches his body and fertilizes them in the water. Each female may lay up to 2,000 eggs in masses of 10- 250 each; they are attached to partly submerged vegetation or other protruding objects.
The eggs hatch, and metamorphosis occurs at widely varying intervals dependent on water temperature, oxygen content, and competition for available food between tadpoles. Evidently, tadpoles of this species are cannibalistic under crowded conditions. Smith (1934) stated that this species breeds anytime after the first heavy rain of mid-spring and (1956) specified that this species normally breeds after a minimum spring rainfall of 88.9 mm (3.5 inches) coincident with an air temperature of 52°F or higher. Fitch (1958) reported that this species breeds chiefly on the lowland floodplain of the Kansas River in Douglas County. Hoyt (1960) found adults mating in a temporary pool on 2 July in Riley County and gave a detailed description of egg-laying and eggs of this species. Knight and Collins (1977) reported adult males of the Plains Spadefoot calling on 23 May at 2300 hours amidst a chorus of Woodhouse's Toads in a sandpit lake in Cheyenne County and observed large numbers of tadpoles of the Plains Spadefoot during daylight hours in small impoundments in the same county. Heinrich and Kaufman (1985) reported two males calling from a temporary pool in a roadside ditch on 10 June in the Konza Prairie. Irwin and Collins (1987) reported two of these amphibians active at night on 4 May and heard seven Plains Spadefoots chorusing at night on 2 June, all at Cheyenne Bottoms in Barton County.
Beetles, crickets, grasshoppers, ants, and other small insects are the preferred food of this species.
Brennan (1936) reported predation on a young Plains Spadefoot by a domestic cat in Ellis County.

Occurrence Activity:
Number of Unique Obervations (=days): 159; Range: 02 Jan to 16 Oct

Chorusing:

Audio recording by Keith Coleman.

Chorusing Phenology: The black outlined dots denote the Julian date (day of the year; 1 January = 1 to 31 December = 365) an observation was made. The thin red line depicts the range of dates between the beginning of the first, and end of the fourth quartile (excluding outliers; Tukey method). The thick light blue bar represents the second and third quartile (interquartile range; the middle 50% of all observations). Only one observation per Julian date is included in the graphs; so a date with multiple observations carries the same weight as a date with only one observation. The vertical bars correspond to the 12 months of the year; January through December.
Number of Unique Obervations: 165; Range: 27 Mar to 14 Aug; Interquartile range: 10 May to 27 Jun;

Remarks:

First reported from Kansas by Taylor (1929) based on more than 50 specimens taken on both 18 August 1926 after heavy rainfall in Morton County. The oldest available specimen from Kansas is KU 5211, collected 18 miles north of Elkhart, Morton County, on 10 August 1926 by Theodore E. White and Edward H. Taylor.
The discrepancy between Taylor's publication (1929) and the respective catalogs of Morton County specimens collected in 1926 are noted. There are 57 Spea bombifrons from "18 mi N Elkhart" collected on 10 August 1926 (KU 5211-67) by Theodore E. White and Edward H. Taylor. There are three specimens (BYU 2159, 2739; FMNH 103461) collected " mi. N Elkhart" on 15 August 1926 by Theodore E. White and Edward H. Taylor. Four specimens (KU 7179-82) collected "41 Ranch, Rolla" on 19 August 1926. KU 3523 from "Elkhart, 81 Ranch" on 29 June 1926.KU 5208 from "18 mi N Elkhart" on 29 June 1926.

Plains Spadefoots are active on humid nights, and during such times, they are often readily encountered on roads through suitable habitat, from April into September.