The Adelaide River Jumping Crocodile cruises started in August 1985 with one jumping crocodile and with time and patience the number of jumping crocodiles has increased to almost one hundred. All the crocodiles can either be seen from either the Adelaide River Queen, Kakadu Princess or Pathfinder cruise boats which operate daily.
The two largest jumping crocodiles are 'Hannibal' at 6 metres. He is the king of the down river section and 'Marrakai' at 5.5 metres is the king of the up river section.
Many of the crocodiles seen from the cruise had missing limbs. This is due to the abundance of domesticated food provoided to the animals. The result of these daily feedings is that the section of river where the cruise takes place becomes overcrowded and crocodiles start to predate on each other.
Despite the industry propaganda perpetually 'jumping' is not part of a crocodile's natural behaviour. In the wild and without human interference a crocodle will lunge once for food every so often. The lunge and grab process of predation places stress on the body of the animal, hence the circus type perfomance that goes on as part of this industry might be great for the tourist camera shot, but not so great for the pysiological make-up of Australia's native saltwater crocodile.
Or we can wander away with the place, side by side with it, this place that wants nothing from us and that we must take from. We take the crocodile purses, belts and back-scratchers with bright red polish painted into the claws that aren't in stock at the moment. Although they have had them and they can be ordered in
I'm just a passenger on a tourist boat looking for a crocodile in a wild river, that's different, but to train the animal to become dependant on humans for food and to then reward with food in exchange for that entertainment is wrong.
Fifteen minutes before the cruise begins the music starts up on the tacky old American piano, whilst everyone stuffs themselves with cream cakes and goes hunting for the usual products for sale in the kiosk on the wharf. We have to take something away from the place that wants nothing from us.
We are cultivating the crocodile for product and in the form of entertainment, like a crop - on a rotational cycle, when the motor starts up and we all move off, into the world that sees us as food or not food, prey or predator but otherwise is nonchalant. The world at Mary River is right. Today we come to prey and protect ourselves from predators.
At least the crocodiles were free. But river cruises such as this one still create an artificial environment. What would happen if we stop doing it? Most of the crocodiles that were dependant on food from the human hand would die. The weaker crocodiles would be eaten by the stronger ones in a river that is overcrowded, overstocked - a river turned amusement park.
There is nowhere for the excess crocodiles to turn but on each other. There are other cruises operating in other sections of river. They same problem of overcowding and internal predation is occuring in these areas as well. To date no-one in this area has addressed the problems resulting from feeding native wildlife
Someone on the top deck threw over a beer can. The skipper said, 'that crocodile will die. Thank you to that very stupid person!' He went on and on. I said to him, 'why don't you have signs for people not to throw things overboard on the boat?' He said, 'We'd have to have it in fifteen different languages.' I said, 'English is a start.' I said 'did you announce it at the beginning?' I don't think he did.
One of the women caught the man who threw it on her video cam. He was a man with his wife and about six children. They were from overseas. The Australian woman said, 'that Asian man did it and his family were all laughing.' The skipper went on and on all over again.
The river is full of crocodiles turned into cats that constantly come home to human beings. Since the these saltwater crocodiles are now dependant on human beings for food, if this food source was suddenly cut off, the result would be mass starvation and same species predation in the overcrowded sections of river.
The environmental impact: The skipper said, 'we are only one cruise and we throw ten tons of gear into the river every year so that must have some impact.' If the feeding stopped then Hannibal would die. And all the stronger crocodiles would eat the weaker half of the population as the river is presently housing twice or more of its crocodile density.
The problem is a beer can, that shouldn't be sold on the boat. I said, 'if you think that crocodile is going to die, why don't you call in a biologist and tranquilize the animal and remove the can whilst its gut sleeps?' He said, 'we don't want the government to find out things like this or they'll put us out of business. Crocodiles are protected.' He then added, 'they're likely to start up another cruise down the road after shutting us down. It's like that up here. No one gives a fuck about the crocodiles, they're just all in it for the money. It's private enterprise - it's business. That's it.'
Crocodiles consume many articles that are thrown or dropped from the boat such as plastic bottles, cups, video cameras, picnic sets, akubra hats and even an esky. The staff make them jump twice for the camera shots and only twice, so that it doesn't stress them out. In the wild a crocodile only jumps once for its prey.
The largest crocodile seen in Adelaide River is 'Apollo' a staggering 7.5 metres. He has not joined the list of jumping crocodiles as yet but they are working on it
The Kakadu Spirit, an unlikely name for an boat used in an industry such as this one.
The river houses two large male crocodiles estimated to weigh nearly one tonne and to be 80-100 years old. They both have large harems consisting of up to 20 female crocodiles are said to be "kept busy during the mating season."
The youngest crocodiles are trained on flesh morsels the size of a teaspoon. Many crocodiles fight in the overcrowded river and as a result have their limbs missing after being bitten off
Birds are also a feature on the cruises with the whistling kites and black kites almost taking the meat out of your hands. The birds are only in for a couple of months every year and become food dependant during this time. The red-legged Jabiru is also fed from the boats. There are three of these, one called 'Bruce.' The other two who are yet to be named, come in close and take meat out of the feeder's hands.
Crocodiles were here for thousands of years before human beings. People should simply stay out of their territory or admire the animals from a distance, rather than impinging upon the environment by making the wildlife dependant upon human feeding and turning the river into a circus for human profit and entertainment.
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