Australian authorities are investigating an American influencer who filmed himself wrestling wild crocodiles in Queensland, condemning the “extremely dangerous and illegal” activity.<\/p>\n
In a series of videos on his Instagram, bare-chested Mike Holston, who goes by the name “therealtarzann” online, tussles with saltwater and freshwater crocodiles.<\/p>\n
In one post, he dives into the water, emerging holding the crocodile by its throat with blood streaming from his elbow.<\/p>\n
“He got a hold of me, but I got a hold of him,” Mr Holston says.<\/p>\n
In another, Mr Holston jumps off a boat and into a bushy waterway in pursuit of a crocodile, which he then wrestles.<\/p>\n
Mr Holston has said the videos, which have amassed millions of views, were for “educational purposes”.<\/p>\n
But the videos prompted outrage in Australia, where the maximum penalty for interfering with a saltwater crocodile is Aus $37,500 (\u20ac21,200).<\/p>\n
The state of Queensland said it was “actively investigating” the two videos.<\/p>\n
“These actions are extremely dangerous and illegal, and we are actively exploring strong compliance action including fines to deter any person from this type of behaviour,” its environment department said.<\/p>\n
“Let us be clear: people should not attempt to capture freshwater or saltwater crocodiles in Queensland, unless they are trained and licensed to do so.”<\/p>\n
The state’s Premier David Crisafulli also called the influencer a “goose”.<\/p>\n
Mr Holston did not respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n
Australia’s famously diverse flora and fauna is highly protected and attempts to interfere with it can face strict penalties.<\/p>\n
Late celebrity “crocodile hunter” Steve Irwin’s father, Bob Irwin, said this week people needed to respect Australia’s wildlife or be deported.<\/p>\n
“These posts can have disastrous consequences for both people and wildlife,” Mr Irwin said.<\/p>\n
Government figures estimate there are between 20,000 and 30,000 saltwater crocodiles in Queensland in a vast area known as “Croc Country”.<\/p>\n
They are a protected and vulnerable species and have been known to attack humans.<\/p>\n
Between December 1985 and April 2024, there were 34 non-fatal attacks and 14 fatal attacks by wild saltwater crocodiles in Queensland.<\/p>\n
Another US influencer sparked outrage in March after a video appeared to show her pestering a baby wombat.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australian authorities are investigating an American influencer who filmed himself wrestling wild crocodiles in Queensland, condemning the “extremely…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":130151,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[90,56,54,55,4407],"class_list":{"0":"post-130150","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-science","9":"tag-uk","10":"tag-united-kingdom","11":"tag-unitedkingdom","12":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130150","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=130150"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130150\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/130151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=130150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=130150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=130150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}