Back at the top of the food chain
This week JOHN ANDERSEN dives into the serious and contentious issue lurking beneath North Queensland waterways, both saltwater and freshwater
Somehow we have to get crocodiles back on the same chain they were on after commercial shooting was stopped back in 1971.
They have had 52 years to make a comeback and boy, have they come back.
Helping them build up in numbers, especially in our more popular waterways, is the free ride they are getting from the government.
Should there be wholesale culling, a return to the skin trade of the 50s and 60s?
Should there be culling of crocs near boat ramps and popular fishing areas in the wilder areas?
And what about the culling of crocs in all swimming areas along the coast and in our rivers and creeks?
Probably the answer will be “no” to the first but, “yes, yes, yes” to the last two.
The death of Laura publican Kevin Darmody, 65, dragged - no euphemisms here – into a river and eaten by two crocodiles highlights the situation.
Years ago not many people went to these remote area rivers, but now the popularity of off-road tourism and the rise and rise of croc numbers have collided head-on.
Last Saturday Kevin Carmody drew the short straw.
He was dragged into the Kennedy River by a croc while fishing from the bank. He was a local.
He would have been croc-aware, but probably he was doing something that took him too close to the water.
It’s difficult to not momentarily put yourself in a vulnerable situation now and again when fishing in croc country.
The risks people will take to retrieve a $20 lure snagged on a branch near the water’s edge have to be seen to be believed.
It’s gotten to the stage where anglers whether fishing from the bank or from small tinnies are in constant danger.
Rule #1. Don’t go out in a three metre tinny. Rule #2. Don’t go anywhere near the water’s edge.
Just don’t.
Since 1975 there have been more than 46 croc attacks, at least 16 of them fatal.
There are going to be more. You can bank on it.
Kevin Darmody’s death follows a series of crocodile attacks in North Queensland over the
It’s gotten to the stage where anglers whether fishing from the bank or from small tinnies are in constant danger
last 12 months. It’s the 12th fatal attack since 1985 when Beryl Wruck was taken at night while wading in a Daintree River tributary.
People do things in crocodile rivers that are unwise, to say the least.
There was the person in February who went for a dip in the Bloomfield River south of Cooktown.
If you’ve been to the Bloomfield River then you know this is like stepping out of a Land Rover in Africa and walking over to where hyenas and lions are feeding on a zebra carcase, thinking everything is going to be okey-dokey.
The Bloomfield River man was bitten, but a croc took his dog.
In cases like this you can’t blame the croc, but as visitation to these once little visited areas increases, more and more people, either through ignorance or some sort of death wish, are going to take risks.
A lot of them think the whole crocodile thing is some sort of tourism marketing ploy. I’ve seen people floating on air mattresses at the mouth of the Staaten River on western Cape York Peninsula.
I was fishing there at the time with a couple of mates. When we yelled to them about crocodiles they laughed.
I once stopped and warned a family swimming at high tide in Sunday Creek south of Cardwell that there were crocs in the creek. They laughed like I was nuts.
Go to Cooktown during the tourism season. You’ll see mums and dads playing with toddlers right at the water’s edge.
The Endeavour River is lousy with crocs, but mention the danger and they’ll look at you quizzically and say something like, “yeah, but that’s a bit of joke, isn’t it”?
They don’t believe it. They think it’s marketing.
There was the amazing story of Marco Tiraboschi in 2021 who was dragged into the Mcivor River north of Cooktown while fishing. The croc dragged him out into the middle of the river, took him down into the depths to drown, but Marco, a self-styled survivalist, fought back.
He had a sheath knife on his hip which he put to good use.
The croc had him by the foot but Marco got in a lucky stab – he thinks it might have been the heart – and straight-away the croc let him go. Marco had Saint Christopher and the will to survive on his side in that fight in the Mcivor, but not everyone has that sort of luck and that sort of fight in them.
I interviewed Marco after the attack. When it came to crocs he was hyper aware.
On the day he was attacked he knew in a flash he had walked too close to the river’s edge.
At the exact moment his mind registered the danger he was in, the instincts of the croc, submerged in the black water only one metre away kicked in.
It launched its attack as Marco leapt back, grabbing him by his boot and dragging him in. Marco was holding on to a tree root with one hand and dislocated his shoulder when the power of the croc tore him away into the water.
The stories of people luckily surviving attacks are piling up. It never used to be like this.
There was a time when we felt safe swimming in the freshwater reaches of our waterways.
Such happy times.
The State Government year in, year out, will say – to shouts of derision - that there is no noticeable rise in the crocodile population. That’s what their counts might show, but everyone who spends time out on the rivers knows this to be balderdash.
It will never happen of course but would a four year open season reduce numbers to the extent where we can again swim in the freshwater reaches of the Herbert, Burdekin River, Tully, and Mulgrave Rivers?
The freshwater reaches of every east coast river and creek north of Rockhampton (that said, I wouldn’t be confident about swimming in the Boyne or Calliope Rivers near
Gladstone) are now the home of estuarine crocs.
Swimming or even paddling a canoe is now risky behaviour in what were once our freshwater playgrounds.
It’s now a proven fact that fishing from the bank, paddling a canoe, checking crab pots in a dinghy or swimming well up in the freshwater reaches in a river can you get killed by a crocodile.
Townsville man Barry Jeffries was pulled out of his canoe and killed by a crocodile in the Lakefield National Park in 2005.
This is where Kevin Darmody was taken. Andrew Heard was pulled from his small dinghy and killed by a crocodile in the Hinchinbrook Passage in 2021.
He was checking crab pots.
Who’s in charge out there in, crocs or humans?
Right now, unless something is done to reverse the order, crocs are boss.