Crocodiles ride ocean currents for ocean travel
Monday, June 7, 2010 - 16:10
in Paleontology & Archaeology
The mystery of how the world's largest living reptile - the estuarine crocodile - has come to occupy so many South Pacific islands separated by huge stretches of ocean despite being a poor swimmer has at last been solved by a group of Australian ecologists. Publishing their new study in the British Ecological Society's Journal of Animal Ecology, they say that like a surfer catching a wave, the crocodiles ride ocean currents to cross large areas of open sea.