The results of a study conducted by Researchers with the University of Sydney, which were published in the British Ecological Society's Journal of Applied Ecology show, that a few tablespoons of cat food left next to ponds in the Northern Territory attracted fierce Australian meat ants, which then attacked baby cane toads as they emerged from the water.

"In one spot we tested, 98% of the baby toads were attacked within the first two minutes", researcher Rick Shine, a Professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Sydney, said.

The toads' population continues to explode, in spite of the efforts by groups dedicated to fighting the pests, by freezing or gassing them with carbon dioxide.

The study aims at boosting the numbers of ants around the breeding areas of cane toads, which were introduced from Hawaii in 1935 and have led to dramatic decline in populations of native snakes, goanna lizards and quolls, a cat-sized marsupial, thereby upsetting the ecological balance.

The University of Sydney researchers have found that meat ants are impervious to the toads' poison.