It always annoys me when journos make passing reference to other not relevant issues, leaving out salient details so that it deliberately casts aspersions on the person concerned. Theyneed to stick the matter at hand.
The shock horror reactions this sort of statement frequentlyelicits would be most amusing if it were not such an important issue. Crocodiles have increased 20 fold in numbersand 100 fold in total biomass (stated by Graeme Webb) in the just over 40 years since they were afforded protection. There are plenty of crocs and they are still increasing. This is inspite of the fact that hundreds are culled every year as part of the Queensland and Northern Territory governments? management programs. On average, over 200 each year are removed from Darwin Harbour alone, the largest being up to 4.5m. There are also the many unreported removals from pastoral leases of crocodiles that pose a real or potential hazard to livestock. So killing of a controlled number each year is nothing new. It is certainly not going to stop their numbers and biomass from continuing to increase.
Fees from hunting would provide pastoralists with some incentive not to eradicate large crocs and at the same time to help maintain them by maintaining their habitat, rather than employ more disruptive land practices. One valid point of concern at this stage is that trophy hunting will most likely target large, dominant males. We know that these animals patrol and control prime sections of waterways, that also contain a number of resident adult females. Most subordinate males bear ample scars to prove how effective the dominant males are in maintaining ?their patch?. As yet, there seems very little hard data to support what the likely influence of removing dominant males would be on this structured social arrangement.
Blue
