Well I cant believe Icelands are doing Exotic Meat: Ostrich, Crocodile & Kangaroo. I think its not right as read how you have to kill a croc.... Dr Clifford Warwick, a reptile biologist, medical scientist and member of the Bioveterinary group in London, disagrees. He says: Theres not a lot I approve of in crocodile farming. Their biology and behaviour do not lend themselves to a captive life. To a casual observer - and that often includes the people who run crocodile farms who are not usually scientifically qualified - the animals may seem peaceful and relaxed. But an animal behaviourist can see that they are stressed. Warwick says that a small number of aggressive individuals will dominate the others, preventing them from moving around. In farms, 90 per cent of the injuries the animals suffer are directly related to the oppressive nature of their environment. As well as wounds from fighting, they develop abnormalities and deformities because they cant walk or swim and they are subjected to water that is occupied by too many animals and this distorts the bacterial balance so that their wounds become infected. The other problem that Johnson, or at least, his crocodiles, could face in the future, is the difficulty of killing an animal with a two-centimetre thick skull. Defra legislation merely says that an animal should be stunned prior to slaughter, but how does one stun and humanely kill a crocodile? Andrews says that the quickest way is to shoot the beast through the head. Warwick agrees but with several caveats. Shooting a crocodile with a hand gun or very powerful captive bolt can work, but its not 100 per cent humane, says Warwick. When a crocodile reaches slaughter-size, about six to eight feet long, its brain is the size of a finger and is housed inside a double brain case - in other words, its encased in two layers of bone. There is only one place on the skull where you can put any kind of projectile and have only one layer of bone. You need to get the right angle, which requires skill and detailed knowledge of anatomy, says Warwick. If you shoot the bullet at a slight variance, the animal will be brain damaged and doomed to die - but not immediately. Warwick has spent many years working as an inspector on crocodile farms and says that he has seen some terrible ways of killing crocodiles. One method used is to sever the spinal cord with a chisel, which can take five to eight blows with a mallet and merely paralyses the animal. Another approach is to cut its head off with a machete. Few people would realise that an alligator or crocodile with his head cut off will be alive for an hour before it loses consciousness. Others use axes, baseball bats or mallets to try and smash the skull, says Warwick. Warwicks final objection, though, is to our own health. Even free-living alligators and crocodiles are notorious for harbouring a massive diversity of pathogens. When people get bitten by them in the wild, the real danger to life is blood poisoning - their bacteria are worse than their bite. Warwicks concern is that these bacteria do not get into the food chain: Crocodile meat is a luxury item, we shouldnt have it in this country and from a public health point of view, we dont need this mess.
Posted on: Wed, 19 Nov 2014 21:33:33 +0000
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