Yanui the crocodile-catcher team’s first croc captured at sea

One of the Surat Thani-based crocodile-catcher team says that ‘Yanui’ is the first crocodile he has caught in the sea – and a lot more difficult than catching ‘Laypang’, which was captured in a lagoon off Layan Beach last August.

The head of the crocodile-catcher team, Nikhom Suksawat, said on Tuesday: “It took 12 days to catch the crocodile because the weather was very poor with waves up to 3 metres high. The plan kept on changing all the time. The crocodile kept moving and our strategy had to change as well.
“We had to check the sea level every time before starting the catching operation, as safety had to be a key concern at all times. We had to make sure that the crocodile could really be caught, and we were able to anticipate its escape routes, otherwise it would have been more difficult to follow as it learned from our mistakes.

Yanui the crocodile-catcher team’s first croc captured at sea
“Yanui was more difficult to catch than Laypang last year as Laypang was in a lagoon, which was a closed area and much easier to control. For Yanui, we had to wait for to her to come to the water surface. After that we would use lights to steer Yanui to another target area where we had more control over the situation.
“When we saw Yanui’s red eyes, we used two layers of fishing nets to enclose the crocodile, before capturing it.”