Two of the crocodiles were released up to 80 kilometres away, along the west coast of Cape York, with one carried via helicopter 400 kilometres to a remote beach on the east coast of Cape York. Tiny Tim, a male crocodile involved in Professor Franklin's latest research, detected on Thursday, September 10, 2015, north of Weipa. This crocodile, which weighed about 350 kilograms and measured 4.5 metres, shocked Professor Franklin's team at the time by swimming over 400 kilometres around the tip of Cape York in less than 20 days to return home. This feat not only destroyed any notion of relocating problem crocodiles found in far north Queensland, it also proved, for the first time, that crocodiles use currents to travel long distances, Professor Franklin said. "When we translocated it from the west coast of Cape York to the East Coast, it didn't go straight back home, it waited around for several months," he said.

"It was the first time anyone had shown that crocodiles use currents to travel. Crocodile numbers seem to have risen in Queensland's north. Credit:Terry Trewin "If they are travelling long distances in river systems they will use tidal movement in and out of the river to facilitate their travel." Unfortunately this has meant other more invasive methods have been put in place to manage problem crocodiles. "If there is a problem animal likely to impact humans or livestock, then the government's Department of Environment makes all attempts to try and catch that animal and then place it into a farm or zoo; try to find some place that will take it," Professor Franklin said.

"If they are unable to capture it, they are able to make the decisions to shoot the animal, but they try not to do that. "In terms of the population, it makes very little difference whether the animal is moved or shot, because its ability to reproduce (in the wild) has been lost. Professor Franklin's team has been tagging and tracking crocodiles ever since in a bid to better understand these apex predators. "We have the longest and largest tracking survey ever done on crocodiles," Professor Franklin said. "The more we know about a species, the better we can conserve it, protect it and the better we can manage it; manage its protection and conservation."

Professor Franklin and his team use a combination of satellite tags, that are costly and short-lived, and acoustic tags, which are implanted into the animal and have more longevity. More than 130 crocodiles have been tagged with acoustic tags since 2008 in a bid to conduct longer-term studies. "These days in the age of climate change what we want is long term data that goes over multiple years and that way you can see the patterns that emerge and the animals behaviour and movements," Professor Franklin said. "We are losing species at a very fast rate because of human impacts on the environments. What we want to understand is how animals respond to those impacts." Professor Franklin hopes his research will educate people to live safely alongside crocodiles.

"We can inform people how to behave around crocodiles and then how to reduce those negative interactions, which is good for humans and good for crocodiles," he said. "We can look at crocodile behaviour, look at the patterns that exist and say this is a bad idea to be in this area, or exhibit these behaviours as there could be chance there could be a crocodile there. "There are instances where crocodiles like to hang around where humans are and in these cases I have to agree with the management option that that risk needs to be minimised by removing that animal. "Most of the reasons these crocs go around boat ramps is because people stupidly feed them. "The best way to protect people is to educate them about how to live alongside crocodiles safely."

Professor Franklin hopes his tracking devices and crocodile research will not only help keep humans safe, but also crocodiles safe as well. "We have a habit of wanting to shoot animals that pose a threat, or that have a trophy value, which I find objectionable firstly because we don't fully understand how much that could affect the population structure and secondly the behaviours of some individuals." "We are conscious of that and hopefully our research provides insight into the role of crocodiles in ecosystems." Stay informed. Like Brisbane Times on Facebook.