South African crocodiles 'in mass escape' during floods

The BBC reports on a flood risk that nobody ever thought of: About 15,000 crocodiles have reportedly escaped from a farm in South Africa's far north amid heavy rains and flooding. The owner was forced to open the crocodile farm's gates on Sunday to prevent a storm surge, the local Beeld newspaper says.

Many of the crocodiles have been recaptured, but more than half are still on the loose, it says. The floods have killed at least 10 people in Limpopo province. The crocodiles escaped from the Rakwena Crocodile Farm, a tourist site about 15km (nine miles) from the small town of Pontdrif, which borders Botswana.

Zane Langman, the son-in-law of the farm's owner, told the newspaper that many of the crocodiles had escaped into dense bush and the Limpopo River, the second biggest in South Africa. "There used to be only a few crocodiles in the Limpopo River. Now there are a lot. We go to catch them as soon as farmers call us to inform us about crocodiles," said Mr Langman....

Crocodiles in South Africa, shot by Dewet, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license