Anglers warned to stay away from crocodile lagoon
KOTA KINABALU: Going fishing at the Likas lagoon where two crocodiles have been spotted over the past two months is a bad idea, the Sabah Wildlife Department has warned.
Department director William Baya said they were advising the public to stay away from the lagoon, about 3km from the city’s downtown area, for now.
“We don’t want any untoward incident,” he told The Star when asked about the continued presence of anglers in the lagoon. He said the department was also installing warning signs around the area to alert the public on the presence of the crocodiles.
Baya said rangers from the Wildlife Rescue Unit had also installed three traps in the lagoon to capture the crocodiles.
Anglers were spotted fishing at the lagoon on Tuesday, two days after mechanic P. Immanuel saw a two-metre long crocodile basking in the sun there.
Immanuel said that in June, he saw a 1.2m long crocodile at the same lagoon.
He said the crocodile he spotted on Sunday appeared to have no fear of human presence as it did not swim away when he was taking photographs of it.
The Wildlife Department had also set traps in the lagoon last September after a Department of Drainage and Irrigation employee spotted a 1.5m long crocodile in the area. However, the traps have remained empty and wildlife officials believed the reptile could have ended up captured in fishing nets.
In the past five years, he said, more than 50 crocodiles were caught by Wildlife Rescue Units and relocated to forest reserves and rivers far from human habitation.