AN ANGLER has been left reeling after catching a crocodile near Dundee.
Jack Johnston, 33, was fishing on the River Tay on Tuesday when he spotted the sharp-toothed reptile’s skull.
The joiner was just 20 miles from Dundee when he made his bizarre find and immediately thought of 80s blockbuster “Crocodile Dundee”.
The father-of-two called his friend, Jason, and sent pictures of the muddied remains to his pal to check they were seeing the same thing.
The pair then spoke to a reptilian expert from London Zoo, who was able to confirm their suspicions.
Jack said: “I went down with my mate to do a bit of fishing on the pier. The tide was out and I spotted the skull lying there.
“It took us a couple of minutes to realise what it was. I jokingly said that it looks like a crocodile.
Now it’s not everyday you find a crocodile head in Scotland, but it definitely looked real and I immediately called a contact at the zoo.
Jason
“It’s hard to say where it’s come from really, we don’t know whether someone had it as a pet.
“It’s a complete mystery, a proper strange one and the last thing you’d expect to see washed up in Newburgh.”
Jason said: “Jack rang me and told me he’d found a crocodile skull.
“Now it’s not everyday you find a crocodile head in Scotland, but it definitely looked real and I immediately called a contact at the zoo.
“They were able to verify it as belonging to a crocodile, which they estimated to be around three-years-old.
“We laughed about it on the day, it’s our running joke that we’ve discovered the new Crocodile Dundee.”
The rare find was in excellent condition, with the majority of its teeth in place and parts of the brain still intact, Jason said.
He added: “All the teeth are in it, even if a few are a bit wobbly, and it’s got a smell to it. You can tell there’s some brain matter in there.
“If he got you by the arm, you would definitely know about it.
“We’ve spoken to a few reptilian experts who are keen to look at it and do some further testing.”
Chris Newman, director at the National Centre for Reptile Welfare, estimated the animal could be a Nile or a saltwater crocodile.
He said: “We get two or three calls a year about people finding crocodiles in the wild and they always turn out to be toys.
“So when I got the call about finding one on Tayside in Scotland, naturally I was deeply cynical. It makes no logical sense.
“But after seeing the images and information that they’ve given me, I’m 99.99% sure this is real.
“People have been known to keep caiman crocodiles as pets, but this looks to be of the nile or saltwater variety – originating from either Africa or Asia respectively.
“Trophy hunters often buy and sell such items in the UK, but these are often cleaned thoroughly by taxidermists and rarely found with flesh attached.”
He continued: “In all my 25 years of experience doing this, I’ve never had anything like this before. It’s honestly baffling as to how it got there.”
The reptilian expert suggested further research could be done to understand the original location of the animal at the Royal School of Veterinary Studies in Edinburgh.
