Exotic Pets: Crocodile

Crocodiles belong to the Crocodylidae family. Crocodiles can be traced back to the Cretaceous period and the Triassic period. This family also includes alligators and caimans. Crocodiles are huge aquatic reptiles and live in fresh water bodies such as rivers, wetlands, lakes and brackish water. They are found in America, Africa, Australia and Asia. Crocodiles are often confused with alligators. Crocodiles have a V shaped head and alligators have a U shaped head.

Crocodiles are recommended for those who have a past experience with dangerous exotic pets. They are certainly not advisable for beginners and even intermediate pet owners. People that are interested in reptiles can opt for agamid, geckos, skinks, and small snakes. Crocodiles are for extremely experienced hobbyists. They are extremely difficult to handle, housed and the expenses just keep on increasing. Even small juvenile crocodilians become hard to handle after one year. As they grow older, they become more dangerous and stronger. It is only after this, the owners realize the harsh truth and they release the crocodile illegally in the wild. The matter becomes even worse, because since the pet gets habituated of human company, it will loose fear and will become more confident and attack people more easily and frequently.

These reptiles are often underestimated, but they are very strong and fast. Lots of practice should be done before handling a crocodile. In fact, the larger the crocodile, the more the number of people required for handling it. If untrained or inexperienced team handles a crocodile, they are prone to getting serious injuries and might even die on the spot. No amount of training can tame the crocodile. Most of the owners are in delusion in this regard. A lot of hard work and many years of time would have be invested to tame a crocodile.

Crocodiles have a streamline body, which facilitates swimming. While swimming, they tuck their limbs to the side of their bodies, which help them to swim even faster as that decreases the water resistance. Their webbed feet help them to make fast and sudden turns. Muscles that are involved in closing the jaw are so powerful that the jaw can shut with a pressure of three thousand pounds per square inch. Their teeth are very sharp which they use to tear flesh of their prey. They also have very sharp claws.

But the good thing is that the muscles that are used to open the jaws are extremely weak. Incase of an attack, the victims should hold the jaw and shouldn’t allow the crocodile to open its jaw. That is the reason why, when the crocodile is being transported, the jaws are kept shut with big rubber bands made out of automobile inner tubes. The lateral movement of the neck is restricted by nature in this reptile, so when a human faces an attack on land, he can save himself by getting behind a small tree with the crocodile at the other side.

Crocodiles eat both vertebrates and invertebrates. For example, they eat mammals, reptiles, fishes, crustacean and mollusks. They can live up to minimum of thirty years and can even cross hundred years of age. Owners should be certainly aware of this fact and make preparations in advance because there is larger possibility that the pet outlives the owner. Crocodiles can grow from five feet to six feet and can weigh nearly three thousand pounds. At birth they measure twenty centimeters only. This is also one of the factors, which tempts owners to keep them as pet and when they begin to grow, the owner panics and starts thinking of abandoning them.