Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi everyone,

Episode 5 of the CrocLog Podcast is now available. This time we interview John Brueggen, director of the St Augustine Alligator Farm about the recent laying of fertile gharial eggs in the US (plus a fair bit of chat about SAAF), we discuss Crocodylus suchus, critique a recent TV show where the host and cameraman throw themselves into the water with wild Nile crocodiles, and talk about some recent croc news.

Download links are available here:

http://crocodilian.blogspot.com

Also available on iTunes.

Cheers
Adam
CrocBlog (with links to podcast episodes)

Maybe to liven up this dead forum we could discuss the podcast.
Adam interviewed a guy from St. Augustines. They of course talked about training crocs. They talked about signals.
I'm no croc trainer but having been a keeper for 25 years I'm still constantly amazed
at a crocs ability to know when it is dinner time.
Like I said I'm not a trainer but over the years these are some signals that told my crocs it was dinnertime.
At first I just made a grunting noise.
Then clicking my barbeque tongs together. Or tapping them against metal fencing.
Some signals aren't even intentional.
Tearing open plastic grocery bags.
When I fed a lot of chicken, putting on latex gloves.
All of these sounds or actions would get the crocs excited and they would come to be fed.
I think the most interesting one. The one that shows the highest level of intelligence was another unintentional one.
I worked at a reptile zoo called the Snake Farm back in the 90's and on Sunday we would feed the gator pond.
The owners wife would get on the P.A. system and say, " In about 15 minutes we will feed the gators at the outside pond. 15 minutes gator feeding at the outside pond."
Immediately all the gators and crocs start coming out of the water to be fed.
That was simply the longest message that was ever said over the intercom.
Typically it was ,"Danny come to the front", or "John you have a phone call".
During these short messages not a croc budged. But during the croc feeding message all the crocs would come to get fed. Before they saw a keeper and before the people started to amass. The only other answer is they had a calendar and they knew it was Sunday.
Trainers or not does anyone else have any interestin signals for their crocs? D.C.

My caiman learned real quick with a clicker.
We don't use it with the dogs anymore so I started with the caiman. Took about a month.

Not too sophisticated but I was surprised at how quick he learned.

Mr. F
-----
Real time Rogue, a captive Palp

Yeah I'm never surprised about croc attacks. Especially when the person is doing the same routine. Crocs pick up routines very quickly. In the wild or a captive situation. D.C.

I love the Croc Log podcasts. I, too, found the stories from the St. Augustine Alligator farm about the conditioning/training of the crocodilians fascinating. I especially loved the one about the clicker trained Tomistoma, I think it was. I actually had no idea that they could be trained to know a name or a noise as their cue for food. The more I learn about crocodilians the more amazing they are.