Following Up Wounded Dangerous Game : A Professional Shikaree's Most Loathed Task

[Newboomer]

Thank you. The thought crossed my mind that a wounded or dead croc in the water might be cannibalized by other crocs.

 

[Kawshik Rahman]

Thank you. The thought crossed my mind that a wounded or dead croc in the water might be cannibalized by other crocs.

Newboomer
This is a question which demands a zig-zagged type of answer. You see , crocodiles are cannibalistic . Larger Buri Ganga river crocodiles will often prey on smaller sub-mature crocodiles . However , the crocodile being wounded is irrelevant to the cannibalism . It is simply a matter of larger crocodiles eating smaller crocodiles .

 

[Shootist43]

Poton, that was another excellent read. Thanks for sharing your knowledge.

 

[Major Khan]

Poton, that was another excellent read. Thanks for sharing your knowledge.

Thank you so much for enjoying it , Shootist43 . I am privileged.

 

[CBH Australia]

Great reaf.
Kawshik seems to have a real dislike to those Crocs

 

[mark-hunter]

Kawshik seems to have a real dislike to those Crocs

I think that of all the dangerous game, only crocs take humans as regular prey.
All other DG, only under special circumstances, generally when threatened, or when disabled to hunt their usual natural prey.

 

[Major Khan]

Great reaf.
Kawshik seems to have a real dislike to those Crocs

Thank you so much , CBH Australia. Mark Hunter is correct in his assessment. While , l rank the Buri Ganga river crocodile as being 1 step less dangerous than a panther , Kawshik is entirely correct in his risk assessment of these saurian brutes . You see , 1stly : The macabre nature of the way these brutes kill their victims is purely sadistic. A panther or a royal Bengal tiger will bite and claw you to death. An Indian bush boar will attempt to gore you to death with it’s tusks. A gaur will attempt to gore you with it’s horns . An Asian Sloth Bear will attempt to bull rush you and then bite and claw you to death. All of these forms of attack are very feral and instinctive.
But what a crocodile does is purely cold blooded. It grabs the leg of the miserable victim and drags them into the water to drown them. Only after drowning them , will the crocodile then drag the corpse into a hole in the marsh / stream and it will only commence to eat the corpse after rigor mortis has begun.
2ndly : In Allwyn Copper Limited ( the outfitter whom l worked for ) , a professional shikaree was only under obligation to fire when an animal charged anyone in the shikar party. A wounded animal escaping , was the client’s problem. Thus , l was never bound to follow a wounded animal shot by a client. I only did so by choice , and l only followed 1 wounded crocodile into the water. I swore never to do it ever again.
However , Sundar Raj Shikar ( the outfitter whom Kawshik worked for ) had a different policy than my outfitters. They practically guaranteed the client their trophy. If the client wounded an animal , which was in the process of escaping , then the professional shikaree was bound to pursue the wounded animal , finish it off and bring it back to the client by any means necessary. Otherwise , they would not get paid for guiding that shikar. Thus , Kawshik had the unfortunate duty to pursue many wounded crocodiles into the water to finish them off. Considering that l carried out this task just once and vowed never to ever do it again , l can wholeheartedly understand why Kawshik hates crocodiles so much. The fact that he survived so many encounters with crocodiles unscathed , that too by using only a cheap locally made Indian Ordinance Factories 12 calibre shot gun loaded with SG cartridges , is a testament to the fact that Kawshik is a far greater hunter than l could ever aspire to be. At least , l had a well made 12 calibre Belgian shot gun and solid spherical ball Eley cartridges to use against the brutes.