Biologists And Conservation Institutions Compete To Save Orinoco Crocodiles

JAKARTA - Venezuelan biologist Carlos Alvarado (34) grabbed the neck of the young crocodile with one hand and the other hand in his tail. With the help of measuring and sorong bands, he measured it, tracking its growth days before being released into the wild.

The story of Alvaraado - and the Orinoco crocodile he is looking after - is a story of hope and persistence in the face of enormous hurdles.

According to Venezuelan conservation foundation FUDECI, less than 100 Orinoco crocodiles - one of the largest reptiles still alive in the world - still live in the wild.

The animal's natural habitat is in the Orinoco River valley, which includes most of Venezuela and flows into Colombia.

For decades, men and women from the Venezuelan Crocodile Specialist Group have raised children of endangered species in captivity in the race against time to avoid extinction.

However, they said they lost the competition. A decades-long wild hunt for his skin had pushed the Orinoco crocodile to the brink of extinction, and now Venezuelans who fought hard to hunt the animal for its meat and took its eggs to eat threatened to give the final blow.

Crocodile Specialist Group members are no longer young - and the next generation of biologists have largely fled chaos in Venezuela seeking work elsewhere.

Alvarado remains alone to take over the baton. According to him, it is a "big responsibility," reported by Reuters on July 4.

He has a sense of mission, trying to persuade students to take part in conservation efforts.

Meanwhile, Zoo Director Leslie Pantin in Turmero, near Caracas Federico Pantin (59) is not optimistic. The zoo specializes in endangered species and is one of the places where crocodile hatchlings grew up.

"We are only delaying Orinoco's extinction," he said.

However, Pantin and her colleagues continued - researching, measuring, transporting.

Scientists noted the location where Orinoco had long moncongs known to nest, collect eggs or hatchlings. They also breed adult crocodiles kept in zoos and in Masaguaral Ranch, a biodiversity center and a cattle farm near Tamarindito in central Venezuela.

Scientists raised the babies, giving them food in the form of chicken, beef, and vitamins until they were about one year old and grew to a weight of about 6 kg (13 pounds).

Adult Orinoco can reach a length of more than 5 meters (16 feet), and can live for decades - a 70-year-old crocodile named Picopando lives in Masaguaral Livestock. Adult crocodiles have strong iron coats and bones, strong jaw, and sharp teeth. This crocodile should not be underestimated.

However, when they first hatched, a researcher was able to carry one in their hands.

Omar Hernandez, 63, biologist and head of FUDECI, marked the tiny leg of a baby crocodile at Leslie Pantin Zoo. To save the species, a number of efforts are needed, he said: research, protection, education, and management.

"We do management, collect crocodile babies, raise them for a year, and release them," he said.

However, "that's all it can do. And it's not done on a large scale."

Every year, the group releases about 200 young crocodiles into the wild.

Biologists waited until they were one year old because it was the most critical period in their lives, Hernandez said. When they were young, "almost everything was hunted."

In April, Reuters accompanied scientists as they released a group of crocodiles this year. The young animals were housed in crates, their jaws tied, for a trip from the zoo to the Capanaparo River, far in western Venezuela not far from the Colombian border, where human settlements are rare and rare.

This part of the river passes through private land, reducing the possibility that the animals will be hunted immediately.

Alvaro Velasco, 66, who has an Orinoco crocodile tattoo on his right shoulder, covered the eye of a young crocodile with a cap to prevent stress during the trip.

"People ask me, 'Why crocodiles? They're ugly,'" Velasco, president of the Crocodile Specialist Group.

"For me, they are amazing animals. You let them go and they live there, looking at you, as if saying 'What should I do in this big river?' And then they swam away," he explained.

Pickup trucks escort scientists, crocodiles and volunteers along the muddy road to a camp near the river, where humans spend the night sleeping in a suspension bed.

The next day, they carefully took the crocodile out of the cage and took it into the river.

The crocodile cubs glide into muddy and greenish water.

"Perhaps many of these animals will be killed tomorrow or the day after tomorrow due to lack of awareness among people and of course because of hunger," Hernandez said.

He echoed Pantin's comments, in the end the Orinoco crocodile is likely to become extinct.

However, he said, "we are stubborn. It is a way to delay extinction and it is something we can do. If we wait for the perfect situation, it will never come."