Record 4,500 crocodiles born in Bhitarkanika National Park

KENDRAPARA: A record 4,500 crocodiles were born in Bhitarkanika National Park of Kendrapara district recently. Amaresh Pradhan, forest range officer of the park, said last year the Forest department had detected 80 crocodile nests and around 3,600 baby crocodiles had emerged from eggs. This year, a record 101 nests were sighted, he added. “The nests are usually made with mangrove twigs, leaves and mud in areas less likely to be inundated by high tides during the rainy season”, the official said.

Pradhan said a crocodile typically lays between 60 and 75 eggs that incubate for 80 to 90 days. Around 40 to 50 per cent  hatchlings are born in each nest.  “Water monitors, monitor lizards, fish cats, jackals, kites, big fishes and other predators feast on baby crocodiles after they emerge from egg shells due to which a few hatchlings survive”, he said, adding that this is a high-risk stage of the life cycle of baby crocodiles.
The forest officer said the crocodile breeding and rearing programme was stopped by the Forest department six years back in the park as the crocodile population had shot up from mere 96 in 1947 to more than 1,698 this year.

He said the department had collected 40 eggs to breed them in the crocodile breeding complex at Dangamala within the park for tourists, researchers and herpetologists. “Last month,  we had provided 40 eggs of salt water crocodiles to Nandankanan Zoological Park in Bhubaneswar where they will be hatched artificially at the breeding centre”, Pradhan added.

Crocodile expert and former senior research officer of Forest and Wildlife department of Odisha Sudhakar Kar said out of 500 baby crocodiles, only one will reach adulthood. The forest officials had imposed a three-month ban on the entry of tourists into the national park during the nesting period of the reptiles as they need tranquil environment during their mating period from May 1 to July 31, he added.

In 1974, the ministry of Environment and Forests, in collaboration with UNDP, had started  a crocodile hatchery  and rearing project in Dangmal within the Bhitarkanika National Park. Thanks to the success of the project, the crocodile population increased from 96 in 1974 year  to 1,698  this year.
In 2006, the Guinness Book of World Records had recorded a 23-foot long salt-water crocodile in Bhitarkanika as the largest crocodile in the world, added Kar.

101 nests sighted
This year, a record
101 nests were sighted
Around 40 to 50 per cent  hatchlings are born in each nest
The forest officials had imposed a three-month ban on the entry of tourists into the national park during the nesting period of the reptiles as they need tranquil environment during their mating period from
May 1 to July 31