Crocodile

Crocodiles and their close relations alligators, caimans and gavials, are a family of predatory, aquatic reptiles. Crocodiles are found throughout the warm parts of the world - in sub-Saharan Africa, India and South-East Asia, Indonesia and Australia, and throughout tropical America. Until recently Nile crocodiles were also found throughout North Africa, and in Palestine[1]. The largest Nile and Estuarine crocodiles may grow to 25 or even 30 feet in length, but this is not normal.

Species of crocodile

• Nile crocodile (Africa)
• American crocodile (Caribbean Sea, including the southern United States)
• Morelet's crocodile (Central America)
• Cuban crocodile (Cuba)
• Mugger crocodile (India)
• Estuarine crocodile (Australia and South-East Asia)
• Johnstone's crocodile (Australia)
• Siamese crocodile (South-East Asia)
• Philippine crocodile (Philippines)

and several others.

Habits

Crocodiles generally capture their prey, often large mammals such as antelopes, by drifting close to them, motionless, pretending to be a floating log, then lunging and dragging their victim underwater, where it is drowned, then left to rot and soften up for later consumption.

Crocodiles typically lay their eggs in a mound of rotting vegetation; the mother will guard the nest from marauding iguanas and other egg-thieves, and solicitously adjust the depth to which the eggs are buried. When the baby crocodiles hatch, she will carry them to the water in her mouth.

Many crocodiles aestivate during summer.

Uses of crocodiles

Crocodiles are commercially farmed in many places, for their leather, which is made into expensive shoes and handbags, and recently, in Australia, for their meat, supposed to taste like chicken. Unlike alligators, they are not used for wrestling.

Man-eating crocodiles

Most crocodiles are good-natured unless provoked, but three species, the Nile crocodile of Africa, the Mugger crocodile of India (for whom muggers are named) and the Estuarine crocodile of Australia and South-East Asia, have a long history of attacking humans.

Crocodiles in the Bible

Some Biblical scholars have suggested that Leviathan may have been a crocodile, though others dispute this. [2]

Crocodile trivia

• They are said to shed Crocodile tears, an insincere show of grief, in order to lure their victims into range.