Crocodiles

Alice holding a 6 month old croc.

Boyd holding a 6 month old croc.

Crocodiles being fed dead chickens.

Mother sitting where eggs were laid. Eggs had actually been removed for incubation.

Young 2 year old crocodiles. Note: sex is determined by incubation temperature of eggs. It takes several years to be mature, they live to be 70+.

We taught our first course of a 4 course program to a young man interested in the Church’s perpetual education fund.  He was a very bright young man who returned from a mission a little over a year ago, and now has a young wife and their first baby is due on Christmas day.  We’re looking forward to see how this process works.  It will certainly be a great blessing to him if everything works out in his favor.  We meet with him Wednesday for his second lesson.  This program has been a real blessing to many here.

We took a couple hours off last week and went to a large crocodile farm which is just about 20 minutes from our flat.  It was a very fascinating experience.  We took several photos and sent them to Kim in the mail so she can share them with you in the near future.  We included all of the photos we have taken so far which is about 100.  They had over 200 crocodiles which they raise for meat and hide.  The sex of a crocodile is determined by the temperature of the eggs during incubation, so they remove the eggs after they have been laid and place them in an incubator and adjust the temperature to give them male or female as they want.  They feed them dead chickens which they get from some large chicken farms nearby.

On Friday we are going to travel to a new area to help encourage students to go to seminary and institute.  It will be a 550km round trip, and it right at the edge of Kruger Park, one of the most famous places for hunting groups and safaris.  We hope to check out the park on one of our future trips.  If you’re lucky, one can see all of what they call the “big five” in one day.  Luck and time of day play a big part in this.

We have had rain most of last week so we are very happy.  Rain means reduced temperature and that brings smiles to our faces!  Overall, the temperature has been very comfortable except for the first week and a few days.