Sharjah24 - AFP: The terrifying Orinoco Crocodile of Venezuela is a monster, yet despite its size and razor-sharp fangs, humans were able to kill it to near extinction.
Millions were slaughtered in the 20th century, mainly for their skins, and today, only about 100 adult females are left in Venezuela, according to the country's Fudeci natural sciences foundation.
Known to scientists as Crocodylus intermedius, the enormous reptile is native to the Orinoco basin that Venezuela shares with Colombia.
It can grow to more than six meters (19.7 feet) in length and over 400 kilograms (882 pounds), making it one of the largest crocodiles in the world.
According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, it is critically endangered, having suffered an 80-percent population reduction in just three generations in the early and mid-1900s.
More than 2.5 million Orinoco Crocodile skins were exported from Venezuela from 1931 to 1934, according to official Venezuelan figures.
Today, such trade is prohibited but the threat persists: the crocs are killed for their eggs and meat, and sometimes out of fear. And their habitat is ever shrinking and defiled by pollution.
Efforts that started in 1990 to breed new crocs in captivity have seen some 10,000 freed back into the Venezuelan wild.
But their numbers have not significantly increased.
"We do a part... to raise the animals and then release them, but after that it no longer depends on us, there has to be protection of these animals, surveillance, control, there has to be environmental education," conservationist Federico Pantin said.
Pantin, 56, manages the Leslie Pantin breeding zoo -- named after his father who founded it -- with his wife Tuenade Hernandez in the northern state of Aragua. It is one of several croc breeding centers in the country.
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