Bob Katter has blasted ‘inner-city imbeciles’ and ‘ignorant wildlife warriors’, warning they will have blood on their hands if they continue to block his calls for an urgent crocodile cull in the nation’s far north.
The MP’s spray comes after a 40-year-old NSW man was killed by crocodile near Cooktown, in Far North Queensland, as his horrified family watched on.
The man had been fishing on the bank of the Annan River, about 320km north of Cairns, with his wife and children when he fell into the muddy waters about 2.10pm on Saturday and failed to resurface.
It is believed he was snatched by a 4.5metre male saltwater crocodile which inhabits that stretch of the waterway – known to locals as ‘Crocodile Bend’ – and dragged to his death at the bottom of the river.
Extensive searches by police and emergency services have so far failed to locate his remains and his traumatised family remain in Cooktown as investigations continue.
A 4.9-metre crocodile believed to be responsible for the attack was on Monday shot and killed by Queensland wildlife rangers.
Mr Katter, whose Kennedy electorate includes a vast swathe of north Queensland, described the incident as a tragedy but insisted the killer croc should never have been permitted to take up residence so close to a township.
He blamed ‘do-gooder southerners’ for allowing the deadly reptiles to grow ‘completely unchecked’ and terrorise waterways across the state’s north – and warned more lives would be lost unless their numbers were brought under control.
A 40-year-old NSW man was killed by crocodile near Cooktown, in Far North Queensland , as his horrified family watched on. Pictured: Wildlife rangers set up a croc trap in the Annan River
It is believed he was snatched by a 4.5metre male saltwater crocodile (stock image pictured) which inhabits that stretch of the waterway – known to locals as ‘Crocodile Bend
‘This is an absolute tragedy where a man has been killed by a crocodile in front of his loving wife and two young children,’ he said.
‘His widow has lost her husband and their children are now going to have to grow up without a father.
‘And it’s all because these entitled, inner-city imbeciles – surrounded by their concrete canyons and colossal buildings – think they know more about crocodiles than the people who live here.
‘These wokies, they tell us we aren’t allowed cull crocodiles – well, that’s just insane.
‘They think a crocodile’s life is worth more than a human’s life – what a disturbing loss of human values.
‘You big city wokies, you don’t know what you’re doing. You’re the ones responsible for this attack – it’s not the crocodile – it’s you.’
Crocodiles were awarded protected species status in Australia in 1971 amid an alarming drop in numbers as they were hunted almost close to extinction
But their populations have since recovered, with between 20,000 and 30,000 crocodiles now inhabiting Queensland’s waterways.
MP Bob Katter has called for an urgent cull of crocodiles in the state’s north
Mr Katter, who has been calling for a cull for years, said an ongoing rise in Queensland’s crocodile population had forced the prehistoric predators closer and closer to the region’s major towns and cities.
‘Crocodiles are incredibly dangerous and there is an incredible ignorance about just how many of them we have here,’ he said.
‘A crocodile mother lays about 60 eggs a year and the numbers are exploding.
‘For thousands of years, native Australians kept the population in check, but now these ignorant wokies have thrown the entire ecosystem out of balance.’
Not everyone agrees, with the incident sparking a fierce feud over the fate of the suspected killer crocodile.
Cooktown wildlife conservationist Beau Peberdy said the reptile was well-known and liked among locals.
‘This is an animal everyone here knows,’ he said. ‘He’s been in that section of the river for at least 20 years and you can often see him up on the bank with two females.
‘A lot of people are now expressing concerns about him being shot because he opportunistically fed on something in his native habitat without knowing what it was.’
A monster male croc inhabits a stretch of the Annan River, known as ‘Crocodile Bend’
He said the large male was at least 40 years old and would have been extraordinarily quick to pounce on anything to slip into the river.
‘If you fell in the water and he was on the other side of the river system, you wouldn’t have time to break the water, let alone get out,’ he said.
‘There’s nothing you could do.’
Mr Peberdy said he was against any suggestion of a cull – and that the majority of Queensland’s crocodiles – about 80 per cent – were found in the sparsely populated reaches at the top of Cape York and unlikely to interact with humans.
Police have not confirmed where in NSW the tourist who was taken by the crocodile is from or the age of the victim’s children.
A Cooktown resident claimed the crocodile had associated people with food as some locals were feeding it roadkill further upstream.
‘People throw roadkill in for it to eat and he could have been sitting there 15ft under the water waiting for a feed,’ the local told the Cairns Post.
‘We have had a bit of rain so the bank would be soft and even if he wasn’t near the edge it could have fallen away beneath him.
‘It’s just horrendous and everyone is feeling about the family, to watch that happen in front of you is unthinkable.’
Police declined to comment on speculation that members of the public had been feeding crocodiles in the vicinity.
‘While the circumstances of this matter are yet to be confirmed, we remind everyone that Cooktown is known ‘Croc Country’ and urge everyone to be safe by practising ‘CrocWise’ behaviour,’ a Queensland environment department spokesperson said.
