Costa Rica News – The Tempisque River Basin is a beautiful area rich in biodiversity. From sea level to 600 meters above, crocodiles live in abundance.
The problem is that this is also a home to humans. There are many farms and even urban areas in the vicinity.
The crocodiles are protected because they are essential to the ecosystem. They eat animals that we consider pests and without them the nearby homes and farms would be full of rodents, for example.
People in the area feel undereducated about how to live alongside crocodiles. There have been 13 fatal accidents and 15 non-fatal ones since 1995. 74% of the population would like to attend lectures on environmental education.
The main things to know include that there is an unstable population of crocodiles. With too many males, the risk of attacks during breeding season is higher. With deforestation the animals are coming into human territory more and more often. For that reason, it’s important to not leave domestic animals tied up because the crocodiles can attack them.
People should not swim in the water or wash clothes in it. They should stop the practice of cleaning fish right there and throwing scraps to the crocodiles, because this trains the crocodiles to approach humans for food. Lastly, if you are about to be attacked by a crocodile it is recommended to insert fingers into the eyes or hit it on the head strongly.
