A few years ago, Rom was chasing giant crocodiles around the world for a film. Strangely, the hot favourites of numerous wildlife films, the famous River Grumeti in Tanzania or River Mara in Kenya, where some truly impressive beasts waylay migrating wildebeest and zebra, didn’t figure in his itinerary. Instead, there was one place we had never heard of before – Lake Chamo in southern Ethiopia – that was said to have even bigger ones. A licensed hunting safari operator reported that his clients had shot a few 18-footers in Chamo, and he had a hunch larger crocs were lurking.
On the very first day out on the lake, we saw congregations of these huge reptiles that were not in the least shy. More than the Nile crocodiles, we were wary of hippos; if we threatened them or came between mother and calf, our boat could be swamped by the momentum of a thousand-plus kilograms of muscle and blubber armed with four dangerously long canines. Unlucky people have been bitten by these mammalian monsters.
The average size of the large crocs sunning themselves on the banks was about 14 to 16 feet. A few were 18-foot giants. Day after day, we went out hoping to find that monster who would stretch the tape at 20 feet. But sadly we couldn’t find any. Rom said the large ones hardly ever basked on land; the large scales on their back acted like solar panels absorbing heat even as they swam with most of their bulky bodies submerged. So it was tricky business finding that ultimate behemoth.
To get away from the tedium of filmmaking, one afternoon I visited the nearby Arba Minch Croc Farm. At the entrance stood a large case of enormous crocodile skulls collecting dust and cobwebs. Using the spine of my notebook, I measured the biggest one through the glass. My jaw dropped. It was larger than the largest Nile crocodile skull on record.
Back at the hotel, I excitedly told Rom to visit the farm with such urgency that he may have expected those skulls to jump up and run away any minute. On a slow filming day, he finally decided to visit. I suspect he did it more to humour me than out of any hope of finding a jaw-dropper. I must confess I smirked when I saw him excitedly calling the manager to open the case so he could measure the skulls accurately. He looked up from his measuring and said it was possible that the largest was the head of a 20-footer; it’s not very accurate to estimate total lengths of crocodiles from skull lengths alone. Sadly, this monster and the others nearly as big had drowned in simple fishing nets.
A year later, Rom returned to Ethiopia to assess the possibility of croc ranching as a local livelihood option for the numerous tribes living along the banks of the lake. He found it unacceptable that such huge animals should drown in fishing nets or that trophy hunting should selectively weed out the biggest and the best male crocodiles from the population. If he could draft a sustainable scheme by which the smaller-sized crocs could be exploited, those large ones would have secure futures.
During the day, he interviewed the various tribal communities and at night, escorted by a nervous guard with an automatic rifle, he surveyed the lake for crocodiles. It was nerve-wracking to hear the hippos grunting in the dark, not knowing if one was about to attack or when the security guy would lose his nerve. Soon after Rom returned to India, trophy hunting of crocs was shut down. But before the ranching operation could be set up, the management of Ethiopia’s Parks changed and the Chamo giants may yet be doomed.
