YOUNG CROCODILE

Crocodilus palustris, popularly known as the Mugger or Marsh Crocodile, is the common freshwater crocodile of India. It is found in marshes, swamps, muddy, rivers, canals and tanks and is able to bury itself in mud when the water dries up. It feeds chiefly on fishes and birds. It attains a much smaller than the Estuarine Crocodile, and rarely exceeds a length of about twelve feet. It lays about twenty eggs in a hollow excavated on sandbanks of the rivers and swamps in which it lives. Its distribution ranges over the whole of India and Sri Lanka, and even extends to Nepal.