Crocodiles With Frickin' Magnets Attached to Their Heads 304
Brickwall writes "Florida, faced with a problem of crocodiles returning to residential neighborhoods after being relocated elsewhere, is trying to solve it by affixing magnets to the crocs' heads. The theory is the crocodiles use the Earth's magnetic field for navigation, and the magnets may interfere with that. What I'd like to know is, whose job is it to put the magnets on?" So far the magnet program appears to be working, unfortunately the crocs have started to collect huge amounts of take-out menus and child artwork.
Interesting. (Score:1, Interesting)
So, what happens when the tape eventually comes off? Do the croc's wander back?
Natural selection (Score:5, Interesting)
Not trying to troll here, but why not just shoot them? Some crocs appear to love to be around humans, some not. Kill the ones who do, and let the ones who prefer to stay away from people have the chance to breed. In a few decades, we'll have a race of human-adverse crocs.
Florida? Crocs? Huh? (Score:2, Interesting)
Alligators in Florida! Crocodiles in Africa, Asia, Australia.
I guess there is some association here with "sharks with lasers". Though here in oz I know which one I rather swim near if I had to. From most to least dangerous (relative) I'd say: Crocodiles, box jelly and then sharks. Sharks eat people more by accident, box jellies just bump into you by accident ... crocs will hunt you if they see you and pursue by water or land.
Re:Natural selection (Score:5, Interesting)
Illegality aside, these scientists [wikipedia.org] artificially selected 'shy' foxes for breeding and ended up with tame, dog-like foxes. Fascinating read, BTW.
Re:Natural selection (Score:3, Interesting)
How about we shoot the humans who threaten animals with their careless abuse of the earth? After a few generations we'll have fool-adverse humans!?
Re:Why? (Score:3, Interesting)
Stereotype much, do we?
It goes with my hunting experience. Mostly blacktail deer, occasionally elk, in SW Oregon. I use a .30-06 slide action, left-hand safety, with handloads of fire-formed brass, 165 grain Spitzer tip boat-tails in front of 59 grain Dupont IMR. There is more muzzle flash than I'd like toward sun down, but the combination lets me shoot 3 inch groups at 100 yards and I've been using it for more than 20 years now.
I can do without the beer buddy hunters who come in from the cities and suburbs in their 4WD rigs with their .300 Magnums and other foolishness. They don't pack out what they bring in, and they tear up the landscape because they don't know how to drive their rigs or know where they shouldn't drive them. Their fun costs everyone else a lot of money in damaged roads, increased erosion, and the problems that garbage in the wild causes. Too many of them also mix beer and bullets and shoot when they don't have a clear target.
I'm pretty sure that Australia has the same breed of "hunter" as that. They seem to be all over.
Re:Interesting. (Score:3, Interesting)
Interesting* fact.
If you can run 100 MPH, you can move across water.
*For different values of interesting.
Re:Interesting. (Score:3, Interesting)
Your environment is land sonny boy; you don't have gills, you don't have fins, no tail, can't hold your breath more than a few minutes.
Whales, seals, and otters don't have gills either.
Unlike other apes our hair is aligned with the flow of water over our bodies - when swimming, not just when being rained on. And we have much better developed anti-drowning reflexes - both in the breathing system and the circulatory system.
Drop a chimp in a lake and he drowns. Pull him out before he dies and he'll likely get pneumonia anyhow. Drop a baby in water and he swims.
We've been in water enough for surviving and prospering there to have been very evolutionarily important.
So just because we're REALLY good at loping across the plains and running down antelope doesn't mean hanging out in water isn't part of our niche.