footloose
RON MOONTHE SAFEST PLACE TO SWIM IS IN THE SHOWER.
C
ROCODILES are back in the news
again. Just a few weeks ago a woman
at Thornton Beach in the Daintree
National Park went missing, presumed
killed by a croc. Locals reported seeing a
five-metre animal in the vicinity.
Now we could go on about the stupidity
of people who choose to swim at night in
waist-deep water where crocodile warning
signs are prominent, but the reality is: as
Australia’s human population expands
and more tourists from here or abroad
travel to croc country, fatalities are bound
to increase. Add the ever-increasing
population of crocs and it’s a recipe for
inevitable disaster.
This incident follows an attack back in
April this year of a Northern Territorian
who was taken from the back of his boat.
Last year when the NT government said
it was edging closer to allowing trophy
hunting of crocs there was public outcry.
I’m buggered if I can see why.
The NT government and some federal
coalition members have wanted to see
the ban on trophy hunting lifted so that
Aboriginal communities can be given the
choice to use 20 of the already available
600 culling permits for recreational
hunting of big crocs.By all accounts, tourists and hunters
can join safaris in the NT that catch and
kill crocodiles, but they cannot kill the
animals themselves. I don’t see much
difference, as the croc ends up dead
anyway. If a hunter is allowed to hunt
and take a trophy, a problem animal
is exterminated and the tour operator,
hunting guide and Aboriginal community
make some money. It’s a win-win situation.
Indigenous Affairs Minister Nigel
Scullion was reported as saying at the
time that “there’s no difference [between]
crocodiles and flathead except for size and
teeth”, and I agree with that.
The NT makes a lot of money and
there’s a lot of employment in the
tourist fishing industry. The croc-hunting
scene could be just as successful and,
while much smaller in numbers, could
generate much-needed income and create
employment opportunities in remote
Aboriginal communities.
I can already hear people going on
about how barbaric trophy hunting is. I’m
sure the RSPCA and the Greens would be
against it, but most of us eat meat, wear
leather shoes and sit on leather seats –
some of us even eat crocodile (tastes like
chicken, I hear). So if someone wants tokill a croc and earn a buck, let’s go for it.
Here in WA (I’m sitting on Cable Beach
at Broome as I write this) a croc was
spotted just off the popular swimming
beach. The beach was closed to swimmers
and a search found the croc swimming
north. Then, just last week in Wyndham,
a croc nearly four metres in length, which
had a tendency to plop onto a small
boat’s stern and scare the crap out of the
folk inside the tinnie, was captured and
brought down to the Broome croc farm.
Of course, only a limited amount of crocs
can be transplanted like that – shifting
them around in the wild has done little to
minimise human-croc interaction.
In Queensland, where the last crocodile
attack occurred, the government is
still sitting on its hands, not wanting
(or unable) to do anything about the
continual problem of crocs. At the same
time, the biggest shark cull in the world
(in some people’s estimates) continues in
Queensland off the most popular beaches.
Bit of a double standard, in my eyes.
Anyway, an old croc shooter in the NT
reckons he tells everyone these days the
only safe place to swim is in the shower.
Good advice that, given the current
situation in the NT, WA and Qld.More Footloose at:
http://www.guidebooks.com.au/footloose.htm170 http://www.4X4australia.com.au