Saltwater Crocodile
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40 free Saltwater Crocodile trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
The saltwater crocodile is the largest reptile alive, a predator that can top a tonne and that shares rivers, coasts and headlines with people from India to northern Australia. It is also full of surprises, from the way it travels to the way it raises its young. This quiz gathers the fun facts people most often look for: how big salties grow, what they eat and how they catch it, how they breed, where they live, and which famous individuals made the news. There are questions on conservation, on the species' long history with people, and on the legends and screen stories it has inspired. It is written for curious readers, students, teachers and wildlife fans. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so you will finish knowing more about the animal than when you started.
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Q 01Researchers testing a saltwater crocodile recorded the strongest what ever measured in a living animal?
Bite force
Bite force in one 4.6-metre saltwater crocodile reached 16,414 newtons, powered by jaw muscles so stiff they feel almost as hard as bone.
Q 02What name is given to the spin a saltwater crocodile uses to twist chunks of meat off large prey?
Death roll
Death roll is the name: peg-like teeth can grip but not slice, so the crocodile spins its whole body to tear prey into pieces it can swallow.
Q 03What decides whether a saltwater crocodile egg hatches as a male or a female, as in all crocodilians?
Nest temperature
Nest temperature settles it: eggs kept at about 31 to 32°C hatch mostly as males, while cooler nests produce mostly females.
Q 04Which river names the crocodile believed to kill more people each year than the saltwater crocodile does?
Nile
Nile crocodiles are blamed for far more fatal attacks, perhaps because so many people live and work beside the rivers they inhabit.
Q 05Which presenter of TV's The Crocodile Hunter named his daughter Bindi after a favourite saltwater crocodile?
Steve Irwin
Steve Irwin named Bindi Sue after two favourite animals: a saltwater crocodile called Bindi and his Staffordshire bull terrier, Sui.
Q 06Which feared sea predators does the saltwater crocodile sometimes catch and eat in coastal waters?
Sharks
Sharks are fair game: the bull shark, which patrols rivers and estuaries too, is the kind a saltwater crocodile is most likely to meet.
Q 07How does a mother saltwater crocodile carry her newly hatched young from the nest mound down to the water?
In her mouth
In her mouth: the same jaws that drown buffalo carry the babies gently to the water, and she stays with them for several months.
Q 08What do saltwater crocodiles ride to cross hundreds of kilometres of open sea while using very little energy?
Ocean currents
Ocean currents carry them: one tracked crocodile waited four days in a sheltered bay until the current turned its way, then swam on.
Q 09Which big cats sit beside orangutans and kangaroos on the list of prey taken by adult saltwater crocodiles?
Tigers
Tigers are on the list, though such prey is rare: only large male crocodiles typically attack very big animals.
Q 10How does the saltwater crocodile catch most of its prey before drowning it or swallowing it whole?
By ambush
By ambush: it waits unseen just below the surface near the water's edge, then explodes upward before the victim can react.
Q 11When does the saltwater crocodile prefer to hunt, after lazing in the water for much of the day?
At night
At night is when it prefers to hunt, though a saltwater crocodile will still strike by day if an easy meal comes within reach.
Q 12Hunters pursued the saltwater crocodile until the 1970s mainly for which valuable part of its body?
Its skin
Its skin makes the most prized crocodile leather, and unregulated hunting for it had cut northern Australia's population by 95% by 1971.
Q 13Saltwater crocodiles partly resist the poison of which pest that kills freshwater crocodiles?
Cane toad
Cane toad poison easily kills freshwater crocodiles, but saltwater crocodiles can eat a few and survive, though too few to control the pest.
Q 21Which shellfish found growing on saltwater crocodiles' scales are a sign of long spells at sea?
Barnacles
Barnacles need time to settle and grow, and saltwater crocodiles sometimes spend weeks at sea in search of land.
Q 22What do relocated 'problem' saltwater crocodiles often do, making such moves pointless?
Swim back home
Swim back home: in one Northern Territory study, relocated crocodiles found their way to their capture sites in as little as 10 days.
Q 23What destroys more saltwater crocodile eggs than any predator, ruining nests beside tidal rivers?
Flooding
Flooding of the nest drowns the developing embryos, and the wet season in which the crocodiles breed is exactly when rivers rise.
Q 14Which country's soldiers were reportedly killed by saltwater crocodiles on Ramree Island in 1945?
Japan
Japan's losses in the Ramree mangroves were heavy, but historians now think most men drowned or were shot, with crocodiles blamed for only a handful.
Q 15Saltwater crocodiles were mistaken for which reptile when three Australian rivers were misnamed?
Alligator
Alligator Rivers was the name an explorer chose after mistaking the broad-snouted saltwater crocodiles he saw there, and the name stuck.
Q 16Which island, where the saltwater crocodile is holy, was formed by a giant crocodile in legend?
Timor
Timor honours the animal as its origin, and Papuan peoples tell a similar myth in which the crocodile is a relative, usually a father or grandfather.
Q 17What Red List status has the saltwater crocodile held since 1996, despite vanishing from Vietnam?
Least Concern
Least Concern reflects thriving populations in northern Australia, even though the species is now locally extinct in several Asian countries.
Q 18What colour are young saltwater crocodiles, which carry black stripes and spots for their first few years?
Pale yellow
Pale yellow youngsters darken with age into greenish-drab adults, and some adults turn so dark they look almost black.
Q 19What does a saltwater crocodile slow down, along with its oxygen use, to stay underwater for longer?
Its heart rate
Its heart rate drops during a dive, and voluntary dives lasting up to two hours have been reported for saltwater crocodiles.
Q 20Which body part have saltwater crocodiles been seen using to knock monkeys off a riverbank?
Their tail
Their tail sweeps rhesus macaques into the water, though scientists are unsure whether the move is deliberate or a lucky accident.
Q 24Which Australian lizards take few saltwater crocodile eggs because the mother guards her nest?
Goannas
Goannas freely raid the unguarded nests of freshwater crocodiles, but a saltwater crocodile mother stays beside her mound, so they are not a major threat to her eggs.
Q 25What does a female saltwater crocodile pile into a mound to build her nest on the shore of a tidal river?
Mud and vegetation
Mud and vegetation form the mound, and the layer of leaves she scratches around it produces a surprising amount of warmth for the eggs.
Q 26A taste for buffalo and which other introduced animals helped Australia's saltwater crocodiles recover?
Feral pigs
Feral pigs gave the crocodiles a rich new food on land as they rebounded from hunting; old bones show they once lived on a more estuarine diet.
Q 27Which predatory fish is singled out among the many animals that eat baby saltwater crocodiles?
Barramundi
Barramundi turn the tables while the crocodiles are tiny, and only about 1% of those that hatch are thought to survive to adulthood.
Q 28On which continent did the saltwater crocodile's genus most likely arise before spreading to Asia?
Africa
Africa is the likely cradle: the genus was once thought to have evolved in Australia and Asia, but genetic studies point the other way.
Q 29Which saltwater crocodile from the Philippines did Guinness certify in 2012 as the largest in captivity?
Lolong
Lolong measured 6.17 metres and took about 100 people to haul onto land; he was named after a veteran hunter who died days before the capture.
Q 30In which Asian city do wild saltwater crocodiles still live, in the Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve?
Singapore
Singapore's crocodiles live in a wetland reserve and nearby marshes, although the species has all but vanished from Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia.