Another croc caught

[waruikazi]

Do you get any clean fish out of the Wilton? Or are they all swamp dogs?

Some of our year 3 and 4 students went fishing yesterday afternoon and managed to catch a 6.5 footer. They managed to tie it up and bring it home before one of their uncles shot it. By the smells of them this morning they had croc stew for dinner last night lol.

 

[SteveNT]

Yea they were all silver fish, no mud barra (I like the way fishing guides call them "golden barra" haha), it's a fast flowing clear sandy river but it's a bugger to cross. I got sideways crossing it when the gauge on the west bank said .8 meter. Had water halfway up the windscreen and the gauge on the east bank said 1.2 meter! It's considered impassable at 1 meter because of the strong flow. I got a few raised eyebrows when I drove into Ngukurr. No-one had crossed for two days.

Good on the young fellas, dont mind a bit of croc stew myself. I'm about to head out to Cape Fright chasing muddies, barra and threadfin for the weekend before one of my rare weeks in the office doing beloved paperwork!

 

[longqi]

Gotta love threadfin
Fight like a mongrel dog

Its actually quite interesting about barra
If you have fresh water in a tank with barra in it they go silver once they reach about 1kg
If you add 10% salt when they reach over 5kgs; they turn golden after a few days and turn female more quickly
But in the wild its the opposite

 

[lazylizzy]

everythings life is equal.. i hate people that step on spiders.. why is there life any less important than ours. ur oppinion sickens me

 

[longqi]

Its quite obvious your kids dont have to walk to school in croc infested areas Lizzie

Nobody has suggested killing all the crocs
But when they increase in numbers as rapidly as they have
and when there are more fatalities and disappearances every year
Then culling is required
Even the best environmentalists on the planet agree that professional culling is by far the best way of maintaining and increasing growth in any animal species that has too many numbers in any given area

 

[zack13]

everythings life is equal.. i hate people that step on spiders.. why is there life any less important than ours. ur oppinion sickens me

So I take it you don't live in a house, drive cars, go to malls etc where animals were kicked out to build these things. Don't be a hypocrite.

 

[waruikazi]

everythings life is equal.. i hate people that step on spiders.. why is there life any less important than ours. ur oppinion sickens me

I hate offending people but if that is your outlook on the world and life then you are 100% delusional.

My life, the people i care about and even strangers lives' are far more important than any single animal on this planet.

That feeling is not unique to humans either. All animals will defend themselves, all mammals, birds and some reptiles will protect their young from a predator and I have personally seen buffalo, pigs and dogs come back for a member of their mob that was being killed by and attack the predator (me).

 

[ianinoz]

Gotta love threadfin
Fight like a mongrel dog

Its actually quite interesting about barra
If you have fresh water in a tank with barra in it they go silver once they reach about 1kg
If you add 10% salt when they reach over 5kgs; they turn golden after a few days and turn female more quickly
But in the wild its the oppositeView attachment 202246

Threadfin are good eating too.

 

[SteveNT]

Just hauled a sackful of fat muddies up the stairs. 3 days of catching and eating, catching and eating all washed down with chilled beer. Checking out rare birds in the deep mangroves (red headed honeyeaters and rose crowned fruit doves, etc)and ducking the crocs flying out of them at low tide. No mozzies, no sandflies, sea breeze all day. Not another soul in sight the whole weekend. Bloody paradise!

Ah well. Back to work.

 

[Darlyn]

Interesting documentary on crocodiles in the Top End on the ABC today. Researchers using satellite transmitters to monitor their movements. They found that crocodiles are making a dramatic comeback, spreading in alarming numbers through the billabongs, rivers and beaches of the Top End. Thousands of cattle are being killed and attacks on people are increasing every year. They showed that crocs are now being found in places where crocs were previously unknown. They tracked one that moved 20k’s in 2 hours, which means areas that are thought to be safe can become unsafe very quickly. Their conclusion was that something needed to be done, but didn’t say what.

 

[longqi]

Daryn ..Pity I can only like that once^^^^

Steve
Dont come to Bali
Lousy bloody fishing here
Have to head to Papua or Kalimantan for anything decent

 

[mmafan555]

How many people are actullay killed by Saltwater Crocodiles in the Northern Territory each year?

What about overall number of attacks?

 

[Bluetongue1]

How many people are actullay killed by Saltwater Crocodiles in the Northern Territory each year?

What about overall number of attacks?

Don't you know how to Google?

Blue

 

[BallaratWildlife]

Having been privileges enough to work with these animals up in Queensland on a daily basis i can understand how people would resent the idea about having crocodiles around, however, a few points of opinion:
1 to compare removing a tiapan from your house to removing crocs from a river is frankly stupid, if i had a crocodile in my living room than your argument may have more validity, maybe saying having to remove a tiapan from the back paddock would be more accurate,
2 on average a crocodile thrives on 1 gram of food per kilo of body weight (under natural conditions, yes, they do on occasion kill and eat people, but there is no way they would choose people over other food, a 4 meter croc has a stomach the size of a basket ball, eating 2 mud crabs or half a wallaby takes alot less effort than a 6ft man, so yes be careful, but crocs will never choose people over other food.
3 the argument that crocodiles have reached pre hunting levels and are moving into new areas, they have had 280 million years to disapate, any place on earth suitable for crocodilians already had them in one form or another, these "new areas" are generaly areas crocodiles have not been since since shooting and are returning, not spreading, also, being an apex preditior they can never over populate, otherwise food would simply disapear, one big reach is their sucses rate (roughly 1 in 50, the other is the canabilism rate (in some areas up to 30% of a crocs diet is smaller crocodiels

 

[SteveNT]

Nobody "resents having them around". People here are happy to share the environment as much as possible (for some people they are a significant food resource.)

What's under debate is the need to cull crocs that are stalking (yes, stalking) local Communities. Just because they cant fit all of you into their stomach doesnt mean they wont kill you for what they can fit in.

I am a 6 foot bloke and I have been attacked (unsuccessfully I'm happy to report) in a river system boiling with fish and turtles. Crocs will choose people over other food if the opportunity presents itself.

On the culling thing the authorities in Florida discovered that culling 10% of the poulation of adult alligators resulted in a 0% decline in the population because the biggest predator of gators is bigger gators.

On your first point if you live in Ngukurr or Daly River or a similar River Community you experience annual flooding, often in the backyard and sometimes the lounge. The crocs do come in and take the dogs and stalk the people.
How would you deal with this? Leave I suppose, but this is not always an option.

A well placed bullet or spear can sort this quickly. It was always thus

 

[longqi]

Ballarat
Queensland is vastly different to NT in both numbers and localities of big crocs
A big croc outside a classroom full of kids is pretty fair comparison to a Taipan in your house??

Barramundi netting is forbidden in NT and that is the biggest difference
Nets kill more crocs than anything else so without nets their increase has been far more dramatic up north

Although they eat rarely in the wild they prefer to eat one large meal than several small ones
This lets them rest more and is the main reason they have not changed much for millions of years
Feeding small meals more regularly is only something that is done at displays and farms
It is done there to increase growth and decrease attacks between crocs

Yes they are moving into old hunting areas; but those old hunting areas now contain humans
If they stayed in the parks in controlled numbers no-one would ever worry about them
But when they continually turn up in populated areas in ever increasing numbers there is reason for concern
Especially since a lot of the larger ones are showing exactly zero fear of those defenseless things called humans

Cannibalism will be one of the reasons they are spreading out more rapidly now
As the National Parks get over populated the over flow has to go somewhere
It goes into more populated areas
Because they can simply spread out more now without hindrance the 1 in 50 ratio is most probably very wrong
The reason is that now they can escape predation by other crocs by moving into another river system
I would estimate 1 in 30 maximum at the present time
If they were permitted to spread out where ever they wanted to eventually they would reach saturation point and the 1 in 50 may come into play again

 

[SteveNT]

Longqi

Netting (commercial and amateur) is still legal in several rivers and a lot of coastline in the NT but now regulated (you cannot net more than half of a creek mouth, etc). The only thing the current Govt has got right so far is buying back a lot of the commercial fish and crab licenses and barring commercial fishing in several big rivers (the Finnis is next, YAHOO!!)

What is scary is that there are reports from traditional owners and researchers that salties are "climbing" areas of rapids and entering places even the TO's have never known them to be (and there are some long long memories there). Until now I have always "known" that salties dont climb and you are safe(r) above upstream structures. I have recently re-evaluated!

Also there are few National Parks where they are spreading from, most breeding areas are on pastoral or aboriginal land.

Off topic, I was in Bali a couple of years ago and waded/swam to a reef at low tide and it was devastated. Only the utterly inedible and juvenile remained. Population madness! All other environmental problems stem fom this. If anything needs culling it's us mate.
How many people in Arnhem Land compared to Bali? Same physical area. It's frightening.

 

[Darlyn]

Having been privileges enough to work with these animals up in Queensland on a daily basis i can understand how people would resent the idea about having crocodiles around, however, a few points of opinion:
1 to compare removing a tiapan from your house to removing crocs from a river is frankly stupid, if i had a crocodile in my living room than your argument may have more validity, maybe saying having to remove a tiapan from the back paddock would be more accurate,
2 on average a crocodile thrives on 1 gram of food per kilo of body weight (under natural conditions, yes, they do on occasion kill and eat people, but there is no way they would choose people over other food, a 4 meter croc has a stomach the size of a basket ball, eating 2 mud crabs or half a wallaby takes alot less effort than a 6ft man, so yes be careful, but crocs will never choose people over other food.
3 the argument that crocodiles have reached pre hunting levels and are moving into new areas, they have had 280 million years to disapate, any place on earth suitable for crocodilians already had them in one form or another, these "new areas" are generaly areas crocodiles have not been since since shooting and are returning, not spreading, also, being an apex preditior they can never over populate, otherwise food would simply disapear, one big reach is their sucses rate (roughly 1 in 50, the other is the canabilism rate (in some areas up to 30% of a crocs diet is smaller crocodiels

1. Walking out your front door, worried about being attacked by a predator known to kill humans makes that a moot point. There is no prize for what is more dangerous. Just recognition that there is a very real threat to human life.
2. The confirmed crocodile attacks are “confirmed” because they have retrieved a body and can find proof of a croc attack. . There are a few unconfirmed attacks that are unconfirmed because they have found no body (they may have drowned). So, mostly crocs don't consume their victims. This would indicate to me that the attacks are motivated be territorial behaviour rather than hunger.
3. This year has been the biggest wet season since the first records were kept in 1966. This means that crocs have access to places unheard of for 44 years. This also means crocs encroaching in more areas that humans frequent. This discussion is about the population of crocs now, not 280 million years ago.

 

[BallaratWildlife]

As said, these points are only my opinion and i understand everyone will have their own,
but walking out your front door there is a million things you should worry about yes, crocodiles may well be one of them, but i can garentee there is more murders in darwin annually than crocodile attacks, do you not let your kids play at the park for fear of muderers? its all calculated risk.
as for the amount they eat, they can certianly look at a human as food, as well all know, but i refuse to believe that they would prefer a huge food soruce over a smaller one (as long as that small one will fill their stocmach to capacity it is the more energy effecient food. the reason for me believing this, several of the crocs at my last place of work were recently caught "problem"crocodiles, and all were put into use for feeding shows straight away, now im only a little bloke and all the males are capable of taking me, however the only time they took their eyes of the food on my pole was when myself became an easier target than the fish, (making me a more energy effecient choice) their is no reason why a crocodile would seek out humans over other food, the take people, yes its sad, but just seeing that most attacks happen where people swim reguyalaly would show you if they chose us as a preference, everytime someone went there there would be a fatality

 

[SteveNT]

Most attacks happen where people swim rarely.

I'm sorry for you if there are a million things to worry about when you go out your door.

You cant seriously compare your adventures at the circus to field observations.

Regarding children, when my daughter was seven she handled a dinghy like a pro but got a wobble up on a pushbike. One time I went to pick her up from school (Thunder Rock School, Black Point, Port Essington, Cobourg Peninsular, Arnhem Land, Northern Territory, (0-8 students) and there was a 3 meter croc resting across the front door. Very concerned little faces at the windows (teacher too).

I bunged a few rocks at him and he dragged himself down to the beach (50 meters away). We hopped in the tinny and my daughter drove the tinny 3km back to home.

I dont think you know anything about living with crocs really.