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| American Crocodiles (Tomas Castelazo/Creative Commons) |
by guest writer Hodari Nundu
Within
the horror movie subgenre of animal attacks, two creatures rest on top of all
others.
The ever
vilified shark has been the star of countless terrible flicks, most of them
involving stupid teenagers, mutilated limbs and unexplainable grudges and
growls on the part of the sharks. Most of these movies have lousy special
effects and present sharks as either mindless killing machines or super
intelligent serial killers that can only be stopped with some sort of explosive
trap. There's no question that when it comes to "real life monsters",
sharks are at the top of the list for filmmakers. The great white shark remains
Hollywood's favorite, of course, but some have tried to be original and use the
tiger, bull or mako sharks as alternative monsters. Some have even gone as far
as to present harmless shark species- such as the deep-sea goblin shark- as
man-eaters.
Some
movies intentionally modify their sharks to make them scarier. In Deep Blue
Sea, for example, scientists use genetic engineering to produce giant mako
sharks with human-like intelligence. This is something many animal attack
movies do in order to explain the unusual, murderous behavior of their stars.
But a vast majority of shark movies don´t even bother with this. Real life
sharks are frightening enough.
There's
no question that sharks can be dangerous under the right circumstances. Some of
them are very frightening-looking. And there's of course the fact that they
live in the depths of the sea. While swimming, surfing or helplessly floating
on the surface after shipwrecking, we are completely at their mercy, and we can
never know for sure where the shark is, and when it will attack. That's why the
shark is such an effective horror movie monster.
Ironically,
the second place in the list of "real life monsters" would likely be
occupied by a creature that probably kills more people every year, than
have sharks in all of recorded history.
This
creature is the crocodile.
***
I've been
both a crocodile keeper and a filmmaking student, so I am probably well
qualified to say this; the crocodile is a superb "real life monster".
Sure, when you see them at the zoo they seem sluggish, sometimes even lifeless
as they bask in the sun completely motionless. During my times at the zoo I was
asked often if the crocodiles in the exhibit were real of it they were
"stuffed", or even if they were statues.
Some
people even threw small stones or other objects to the reptiles to find out by
themselves. This enraged me every time, but the crocodiles didn´t seem to care,
deeply immersed in their cold blooded slumber as they were.
But
underestimating a crocodile can be a deadly mistake. They can move with
incredible speed, snap their jaws in a fraction of a second, and drag a hapless
keeper to a watery grave without warning. A co-worker of mine almost lost a
foot when a three-meter long American crocodile that seemed asleep suddenly
turned around and caught his leg with its teeth. He was lucky; he was rescued
by the other keepers before the crocodile could drag him to the water.
American
crocodiles, like the one who attacked my co-worker, are the most widespread in
Mexico. They can grow up to 6 or perhaps even 7 meters long, being among the
largest crocodilians in the world. Due to their rather slender body, however,
they are usually not as heavy as the largest Nile or saltwater crocodiles. According
to most experts, the saltwater crocodile (native of Southern Asia and northern
Australia, and formerly also found in eastern Africa), which reaches lengths
comparable to those of the American croc, is the largest reptile in the world,
weighing up to 1000 kg or more. There’s been many rumors and unconfirmed
reports of larger salties, however; some crocodiles shot in Orissa, India (a
place famous for its giant salties) were said to be 8 or even 10 meters long, a
size that could be best described as “dinosaur-like”. However, when the skulls
of these monsters were examined, there was no reason to assume they were longer
than 6 to 7 meters.
The
largest verified saltwater crocodile alive today is Lolong, an enormous male
(said to have eaten people) captured in the Philippines; at 6.17 meters long,
he is not only the largest crocodile reliably measured, but also the largest in
captivity.
Interestingly,
claims of crocodiles as large as Lolong have been made in my own country. One
of Mexico’s most respected zoologists, Miguel Alvarez del Toro, claimed to have
seen a crocodile in the Cañon del Sumidero, Chiapas, measuring at least eight
meters long. Closer to my home, in Colima, a crocodile park kept the skull of
an enormous male which according to the park rangers measured six meters and a
half before he wandered out of the park’s limits and was shot to death by some
idiot with a gun. Unfortunately, I never got the chance to photograph the skull
and so I cannot verify these claims.
The truth
is, crocodiles probably grow larger than we think, but we rarely give them the
chance to. Like many other animals, including snakes, sharks and tigers, they
may be shrinking due to human pressure; there’s less food for them, and people
shoot them before they can reach their full physical potential.
Even so,
the largest crocodilian species still reach impressive sizes. Nile, Saltwater,
American and Orinoco crocodiles all reach 6 meters long or more, as does the
fish-eating gharial. The American alligator and the Indian mugger can both grow
to over 5 meters long. The black caiman, considered the largest predator in the
Amazon basin, probably reaches over 6 meters as well, although due to its
scarcity and remote habitat, little is known about it. Except for the gharial,
all of these crocodilians have been known to eat people, and two of them- the
Nile and Saltwater crocodiles- kill more people annually than any other wild
predator.
They will
eat anything they can capture. Lion claws have been found in the stomach of
Nile crocodiles, and they are known to attack even rhinos and elephants
(although attacks on the latter are usually unsuccessful). Gustave, the famous
man-eating crocodile of Burundi, is said to have killed and eaten an adult male
hippopotamus- a beast most crocodiles wisely avoid.
Saltwater
crocodiles have an even wider menu, ranging from water buffaloes to sharks, and
in 2011, one of them killed and ate an adult male tiger in the Sundarbans- an
impressive feat, as tigers often fare well against crocodiles, even in the water.
The other
crocodilian species tend to be much smaller and less ambitious when it comes to
their menu. All of them can deliver a nasty and dangerous bite, but most of
them avoid people and they rarely attack.
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| False Gharial (Fritz Geller-Grimm/Creative Commons) |
The
endangered false gharial is a special case. Rarely mentioned in books as one of
the large crocodilians, it is now known to reach 6 meters long or more, and in
2008, one of them shocked the world when it killed and ate a man in Malaysia.
Before this, the false gharial was thought to be mostly a fish-eater.
Next:
Primeval
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