Tamil Nadu   

Stray crocodile `not from the wild'

P. Oppili

Chennai's outlying areas "have no habitat suitable for them"

— Photo: A. Muralitharan

HARDY SURVIVOR: The marsh crocodile that strayed into a house at suburban Peerkankaranai last week.

CHENNAI : The marsh crocodile that strayed into a house in Peerkankaranai, near Tambaram, could not have been from the wild, says herpetologist, Romulus Whitaker.

The outlying areas of Chennai have no habitats suitable for crocodiles, though such habitats must have been there two centuries ago, even within what is now the city, he maintains.

The four-foot long crocodile entered a house of a transport department employee early on Monday frightening the residents.

It was caught by the Wildlife department officials and taken to the Vandalur zoo.

The reptile is healthy and is being kept in an enclosure with other crocodiles, zoo officials said.

In the last 40 years there were no records of crocodiles straying from the wild into a human habitation, Mr Whitaker says, adding that nearly two decades ago a crocodile was sighted in the Otteri Nullah near Stanley Medical College.

However, the reptile was run over by a train when it tried to cross the railway track.

Explaining how the reptile could have strayed into a human habitation, Mr. Whitaker said a kite or a crow could have picked up a two or three-day old baby crocodile from captivity (in the zoo, which could have slipped and fallen into a water body. The baby crocodile could have gone undetected for years and come out now, he says.

He recalls a similar incident in June 1997, when residents of Mylapore near the Buckingham Canal, sighted a year-old crocodile.

By the time Forest officials could arrive, a crowd had lynched the crocodile, which was identified as a salt-water crocodile, an endangered species.

Mr Whitaker added that when crocodiles stray into a human habitation, they end up getting killed. "The one that strayed into a house in Peerkankaranai early on Monday was lucky as it was rescued and rehabilitated even before human beings could harm it," he says.

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