Why the Crocodile Matters

It would be easy, reading a book like this one, to think of the crocodile only as a threat to be endured or removed. That would be a mistake, for the wetland it anchors and for what its survival says about us. And the mistake reads the same everywhere the animal lives. From the mangrove coasts of the Bay of Bengal to the rivers of northern Australia, the saltwater crocodile is not a flaw in an otherwise pleasant landscape. It is one of the pillars holding that landscape up.

An apex predator and a keystone species

Wherever it settles, the saltwater crocodile is the top predator, from the rivers and wetlands of northern Australia to the mangrove coasts of South and Southeast Asia, and everywhere it lives it shapes the entire ecosystem beneath it. Scientists describe crocodilians as apex predators and keystone species: animals whose presence regulates the populations of other species, maintains the balance and structure of the food web, and helps keep the whole freshwater and coastal system healthy and resilient. That is the word. Remove the crocodile and the system does not become safer or richer; it becomes unbalanced. Predators at the top keep prey populations in check, recycle nutrients through the system, and sustain a diversity of life that collapses without them. The crocodile is, in the truest sense, load-bearing.