North Australian FISH FINDER TM forums

22 people have been killed washed of WA rocks whilst fishing since 2002. More people (mostly kids and the elderly) are killed by dog attacks each year than crocs. Don’t ask me for figures caused by driving drunk?? What are the stats on snake deaths, you have to look hard for a snake death reports in the media.

Now take a shark or croc fatality and it’s a guarantee to make the national press for a good week. Apparently we don’t take too well to be eaten and reactions from the press to the public is well out of proportion compared to other forms of death.

Two questions – What’s odds of any of us ending up croc poo compared to the odds of us spending the last six months of our lives tied to an oncology clinic watching our own life ebb with absolutely no control over events?

Given your response; if the sum total of your life was 70 years - from a personal perspective if you had the choice would its end be on the river and over in an instant or in the hospital in a morphine coma?

Crocs an apex predator? Bugger me there’s a lot scarier organisms out there that make them look like girl’s blouses.

Dick wrote:22 people have been killed washed of WA rocks whilst fishing since 2002. More people (mostly kids and the elderly) are killed by dog attacks each year than crocs. Don’t ask me for figures caused by driving drunk?? What are the stats on snake deaths, you have to look hard for a snake death reports in the media.

Now take a shark or croc fatality and it’s a guarantee to make the national press for a good week. Apparently we don’t take too well to be eaten and reactions from the press to the public is well out of proportion compared to other forms of death.

Two questions – What’s odds of any of us ending up croc poo compared to the odds of us spending the last six months of our lives tied to an oncology clinic watching our own life ebb with absolutely no control over events?

Given your response; if the sum total of your life was 70 years - from a personal perspective if you had the choice would its end be on the river and over in an instant or in the hospital in a morphine coma?

Crocs an apex predator? Bugger me there’s a lot scarier organisms out there that make them look like girl’s blouses.

Could agree more, you have better odds dying in the next six months of cancer.

I had an interesting conversation about this with my grandmother today, who was telling me about her schools days in darwin 80 something years ago, she was saying real Territorians have never swam here, it was only the rich hippys and the criminals that decided to hide up here from the 70s and 80s. She's a funny old duck.

Matt Flynn wrote:If he was fishing up the top of the South Alligator as the latest news report suggested he might have been in the little waterholes where you can only get a cartopper in.

I don't have any further info though, the details will be keenly awaited by barramundi fishos because of the safety aspect.

Thoughts again to the family, it doesn't get much worse.

Hi Matt, I wondered if you had heard anything more about this incident?

Does anyone know who the man is?

Is anyone worried about going fishing on the South Alligator River now? Any local knowledge would be great to hear.

Thanks,
Sarah Dean (news reporter at Daily Mail Australia)

I agree that the solution is to take a rifle and shoot any croc that comes close to your boat, I've seen it done and it works just fine. I'll be doing that from now on whether I'm in Kakadu or not.

Thanks Coops, I forgot about that one.

I'm not against a cull but I think the research needs to be done before we just go out and kill every croc we come across.
What size croc should be necked? Over 3m, 2m or even 1m.
Even a 1m croc can inflict a lot of damage to us soft-fleshed humans.
We all know what happened when the major predator is wiped out in the scheme of things. No one knows what will happen if they are wiped out.
What happens to the small crocs that are left behind when they grow up? Could it be that the little ones left behind by the hunters in the 70’s have now grown up with no fear of us and that’s why they approach boats nowadays
Rather than killing them, could they be trained to fear us?
My current preference is to give any croc that takes an interest in me a gentle reminder with a length of 30mm rhs steel. A flog on the head by everyone must surely have an effect. We know they can be trained to some extent. We know the ones on the Adelaide have become adapted to following the boats for a feed.
If we kill them all they will never learn and will always be a problem.
Where do we start the cull? Every waterway would have to have the big ones taken out.
Maybe if we report every close encounter, the rangers can take some action.

Several southern mates and relos were camped at the Daly a few weeks ago. I took them down river and we only saw 1 croc on the banks but the water was warm. On Sunday, I counted 15 on the same sandbar sunning themselves.
Just because we cant see them doesn’t mean they aren’t there.

I can tell you that when I went for the unscheduled swim at the Daly ramp on Sunday, I was packing it. You never know where they are.


Like any thinking person, I'm open to have my views changed by a good argument. The only real way to stop attacks is to wipe them out. otherwise the little ones will grow up

I've been fishing all weekend out at Kakadu. The bloke was taken at Flying Fox Billabong. Poor bugger and his family. RIP.

Culling isn't the answer and they'll never let culling take place in a national park anyway. Kakadu is for the wild, we're just visiting their home. Got to respect that and keep it in mind when out on the water.

The way some people were landbased fishing at Carhill’s Crossing on the weekend, I'm surprised there was only one fatality.

Hemi wrote:The size of his boat has little to do with it really...

I go everywhere im my 3.9 edgetracker with no probs, the odd harrassment but safe as if youve got ya wits about ya... I dont hang limbs over the side etc..


Hey bushie, get that skull on ya bar, ill bring a slab round..!

No worries Hemi. I'll grab the ole .303 and git me some 'gator!

All these greenies.... what has this site come to?

Cull 'em all. Do you know how many barra croc eat? Shiploads. Less 'gators = more barra

Hang on, I may still have the SLR 7.62 semi auto in the back shed somewhere...

bushie wrote:
No worries Hemi. I'll grab the ole .303 and git me some 'gator!

All these greenies.... what has this site come to?

Cull 'em all. Do you know how many barra croc eat? Shiploads. Less 'gators = more barra

Hang on, I may still have the SLR 7.62 semi auto in the back shed somewhere...

Killing apex predators in any environment reduces the number and quality of the animals lower on the food chain. Here's a short explanation (http://www.tgsci.org/index.php?option=c ... Itemid=120).

And on Greenies: At least we're not so terrified of an overgrown lizard that we wet our pants like a little kid. There is a 100% fatality rate associated with being alive. You will die. Stop trying to remove all the good ways to go or else we'll all end up obliged to decay in a nursing home, dying of an infected bed sore in a pool of our own cr.p.

On one point I do agree. I don't have a problem with you taking a gun on a boat so you can shoot your mate in the rectum when he's being dragged over the side. Just try not to let too many mentally unstable people get around with them, boat ramp rage being what it is.

RIP to this poor bloke and condolences to his family.
I'm more scared of a bunch of yahoos running around with guns trying to shoot crocs, then the crocs. A cull isn't a bad idea but let it be done by people who know what they are doing, not old timers who like to think when they were swimming 20-30 years ago that they were safe, which just shows how a cull causes people to be complacent.
People just need common sense and 99% of the time you will come home, really you have more chance of dying driving to the ramp then a croc attack.
Obviously there are people for both sides of the argument on here and think they know the answers but when did people start to think eliminating a species is a good way to go?
Also I reckon half the guys around have more chance of shooting someone else, there own boat or a poor bastard cruising past then actually shooting a croc that's attacking the boat/person, I go shooting a lot and there's a lot of dimwits out there, add alcohol and it's a disaster waiting to happen.
Common sense isn't so common anymore, maybe that's the problem

Thats the way bushie...

Get a cannon!

Im ready..! Got me hound ready, im in me cut-off denim overalls & camo wife beater.
Got the VB & winnie blues stocked.
The truck and punt are full, lets go a hunting boy.... 'Shooot em' !!!

We'll be talking with subtitles in no time...!

Hemi wrote:Thats the way bushie...

Get a cannon!

Im ready..! Got me hound ready, im in me cut-off denim overalls & camo wife beater.
Got the VB & winnie blues stocked.
The truck and punt are full, lets go a hunting boy.... 'Shooot em' !!!

We'll be talking with subtitles in no time...!

I know you are taking the pi$$ sort of, but this is the reason why it will never be opened to public.(I hope so anyway)

Has to be regulated. And done by professionals.

But I agree it has to be done. A cull that is, not wipe them out.

sdean wrote:

Matt Flynn wrote:If he was fishing up the top of the South Alligator as the latest news report suggested he might have been in the little waterholes where you can only get a cartopper in.

I don't have any further info though, the details will be keenly awaited by barramundi fishos because of the safety aspect.

Thoughts again to the family, it doesn't get much worse.

Hi Matt, I wondered if you had heard anything more about this incident?

Does anyone know who the man is?

Is anyone worried about going fishing on the South Alligator River now? Any local knowledge would be great to hear.

Thanks,
Sarah Dean (news reporter at Daily Mail Australia)

Hi Sarah

More has been reported on this tragedy from other news outlets.

I cant speak for all fishermen but I know for me this attack is of particular significance. (From a fisho point of view that is...all of the attacks are of course significant).

We probably more than the general community have an awareness of croc behaviour and the history of attacks. It interests us because we fish around them all the time. It has always been a source of comfort to me being in a boat. Even if the clearance to the water is only a couple of feet, being attached to a large machine gives you the impression you are somehow intimidating to a croc. This is bizzare. We wouldnt feel comfortable in a croc enclosure sitting in a 4m square of two foot high fencing.

We are also well aware that nearly every person taken has been in the water at the time. On rare occasions people have been taken from the bank. Even rarer are attacks on someone in a boat and on those occasions its usually the motor that is the target.
But a couple of recent events have caused me to raise my eyebrows. A guy was recently mauled in a boat whilst sitting at night. A few boats have had their motors bitten. It seems more and more there are reports of crocs becoming more brazen around boats.

And then this happens. I don't feel safe any more. Certainly not in a tinny. And definitely not with my children.

I will continue to fish and take chances. That's my choice. But I will get a bigger boat. I will not be as foolhardy at shady barrage.
I think that this event affects all of us.

The South Alligator is no more or less dangerous than a thousand other waterways in the top end of the NT and Qld.

The South Alligator is no more or less dangerous than a thousand other waterways in the top end of the NT and Qld.

oh and WA of course.....

passenger279 wrote:

bushie wrote:
No worries Hemi. I'll grab the ole .303 and git me some 'gator!

All these greenies.... what has this site come to?

Cull 'em all. Do you know how many barra croc eat? Shiploads. Less 'gators = more barra

Hang on, I may still have the SLR 7.62 semi auto in the back shed somewhere...

Killing apex predators in any environment reduces the number and quality of the animals lower on the food chain. Here's a short explanation (http://www.tgsci.org/index.php?option=c ... Itemid=120).

And on Greenies: At least we're not so terrified of an overgrown lizard that we wet our pants like a little kid. There is a 100% fatality rate associated with being alive. You will die. Stop trying to remove all the good ways to go or else we'll all end up obliged to decay in a nursing home, dying of an infected bed sore in a pool of our own cr.p.

On one point I do agree. I don't have a problem with you taking a gun on a boat so you can shoot your mate in the rectum when he's being dragged over the side. Just try not to let too many mentally unstable people get around with them, boat ramp rage being what it is.

Mate, you have already been fishing with me! I didn't shoot you did I? Though you do sound like you are carrying some sort of head injury?

i dont think people will be scared of fishing just at the South Alli now. there are crocs in every waterway up here. i feel for the family but would like to know the complete story. how long was the boat in the same spot? how many times had he lent into the water, had he filleted a fish and Thrown the caucus in the drink etc etc.

pretty scary considering most of us swim the big barra after catching them. got half ya body hanging over the side with your arms hanging in the water. i remember not so long ago there was the photo of the croc with the barra in its mouth with someones lip grips still attached!

will this attack stop me from fishing? not a chance. i might be a little more cautious but you can only do so much. i already carry my gun on every trip. i know u wouldnt have time to grab it and shoot the croc but its a piece of mind when you are on the boat. i've had a few crocs slam the side of the boat while we've been sleeping. i know what i would rather be dead. im not saying every fisho go out and blast every croc you see. that would give fisho's a bad rep (just like every person with a nice car isn't a hoon) but if you have a gecko stalking you or banging the boat.... Game On!!

i think a cull will make them scared of us again. growing up if a croc saw a boat within 200m it'd be off into the deeps to get away and hide. now you can literally ram them (did it on the weekend at full throttle) he couldn't have cared less that there was a 6m boat flying towards him. I'm all for having limited numbers culled by safari's. it'll generate massive $$ for the N.T. and make them scared again. i strongly believe if they dont you will see a rising number of them floating in our waterways. what a waste.