Australia works to save crocodiles from extinction
Australia works to save crocodiles from extinction
Conservation efforts in Australia's north have helped save saltwater crocodiles from extinction. Experts like Grahame Webb and Charlie Manolis praise a program that collects wild eggs, removes problem crocodiles, and promotes safety, allowing locals and crocodiles to coexist. Darwin's Crocodylus Park, run by Webb, houses crocodiles removed for threatening cattle or people. Keeper Jess Grills says her tours help visitors appreciate these reptiles.
Video by AFP
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Conservation efforts in Australia's north have helped save saltwater crocodiles from extinction. Experts like Grahame Webb and Charlie Manolis praise a program that collects wild eggs, removes problem crocodiles, and promotes safety, allowing locals and crocodiles to coexist. Darwin's Crocodylus Park, run by Webb, houses crocodiles removed for threatening cattle or people. Keeper Jess Grills says her tours help visitors appreciate these reptiles.
Video by AFP
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Transcript
00:00 In Australia's far north, even these troublesome saltwater crocodiles have a home, as efforts
00:06 to conserve the reptiles pay off. Jess Grills helps tourists get up close to the creatures
00:11 at this park near Darwin.
00:13 We have got 47 of them in this river. The majority of them again are wild caught, so
00:17 they've all been problematic out in the wild, causing grief, too close to human life. Some
00:22 of them were cattle eaters, so they've all just been taken out of the wild, brought into
00:26 parks like this. They do come in here to paradise, they get fed on a daily basis.
00:30 But people and crocs weren't always happy neighbours. In the 20th century, the creatures
00:35 were driven to the brink of extinction.
00:37 When the demand for their skin to make fashion leather came up, everyone thought that was
00:42 great, they could get rid of the crocodiles and get paid to do it, so it was a win-win
00:46 situation. It wasn't until the 1960s that people were starting to realise that crocodiles
00:52 were being depleted all over the place in the wild. We estimate the population had been
00:58 reduced by like 98% or something. There were maybe 3,000 animals left, but of that, probably
01:07 less than 500 adults.
01:10 After government protections in the 1970s, crocodile numbers began to rise, but so did
01:15 attacks. Croc expert, Graham Webb, says crocodile tourism, the harvesting of wild eggs for use
01:21 in leather farms, and blunt messaging on safety have helped prevent colds, allowing numbers
01:27 to soar.
01:28 But it's been really a raging success story. Now when we look back, our populations are
01:32 almost fully recovered, if not fully recovered. There's maybe 100,000 crocodiles now. It's
01:38 about $100 million a year in turnover, you know, with everybody. It extends out into
01:45 Aboriginal communities and it helps the tourist industry here. So we've made them an asset
01:51 to the Northern Territory rather than a liability.
01:54 With crocodile populations returning to pristine levels, a key hurdle for the region now is
01:59 to avoid complacency around the dangers of crocodiles and their habitats.
02:04 The biggest challenge is to maintain that public support for very large numbers of saltwater
02:10 crocodiles. And as I said, like in 1979 when I started working with crocodiles, there were
02:17 very few large ones. Now the population is dominated by large crocodiles and they're
02:22 the ones that cause the problems, you know, with people.
02:26 For Grylls, admiring the hulking predators up close builds respect and ensures a balance
02:32 between the scaly locals and their potential human prey.
02:35 I was in mining and then I was a mother and now I'm a crop keeper.
02:43 Because crocodiles do look humans as a food source, they do seem terrifying. But if you
02:48 respect them and their territory, I don't think that they would, you know, be as terrifying.
02:54 I don't think that they've got a very bad rap with their name, which I think is very
02:58 unfair on them because, you know, at the end of the day, they've been here for millions
03:02 of years and we've been here for not as much.
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