Saltwater crocodile

Where does the saltwater crocodile live?

Home: Rivers, estuaries and coasts of Southeast Asia and northern Australia.

In the wild you find it in: Australia, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, India, Malaysia.

Conservation status from the IUCN: not in danger.

The short profile

Fully grown it measures Males up to 6 m long. It weighs about 450 kilograms. On the menu: meat.

The story behind it

Saltwater crocodiles have the strongest bite of any living animal, generating a force strong enough to crush bone easily, though the muscles that open the jaw are surprisingly weak, so a person can hold a crocodile's mouth shut with just their hands. Despite their name, they can survive in both salt and fresh water thanks to special glands on their tongue that remove excess salt from their body. These crocodiles are ambush hunters, lying motionless for hours before exploding into a burst of speed to grab prey at the water's edge, then dragging it underwater in a spinning move called a death roll. They can also travel long distances by riding ocean currents, occasionally turning up far out at sea. Once heavily hunted for their skin, saltwater crocodiles have recovered well under protection and are now least concern.

Find it on the globe

Saltwater crocodile is there as a tiny animated figure that breathes and looks around. From far away the planet is only a blue ball; detail arrives as you zoom in, and this one appears once you are close enough. Open it on the globe.

It sits at its real coordinates, not near them — the same numbers listed in the facts above. Switch off the layer for this kind of place and it disappears again; the buttons for that are down the right-hand edge.