Celebrity crocodile hunter Steve Irwin triggered outrage when he held his 1-month-old baby while feeding a snapping crocodile during a show at his Australian zoo.

In a show for the public and the media Friday, Irwin held his son in one arm while feeding a dead chicken to a large, lunging crocodile then put the baby on the ground and helped him walk toward the reptile's pond.

Protests were lodged on a government families crisis line and with police. Irwin also received a warning from child-care authorities.

"He's one month old, so it's about time Bob got out there and did his first croc demo," the typically exuberant, khaki-clad Irwin told the crowd at his zoo in Australia's Queensland state.

The Seven network said it had been flooded with calls about the incident, which revived memories of pop star Michael Jackson dangling his baby from the balcony of a Berlin hotel in November 2002.

CAPE York stockman David George has spent seven nights up a tree in a crocodile-infested swamp, bleeding and with little food – and lived to tell the tale.

"Every night I was stalked by two crocs who would sit at the bottom of the tree staring up at me," Mr George recalled yesterday.

"All I could see was two sets of red eyes below me and all night I had to listen to a big bull croc bellowing a bit further out.

"I'd yell out at them, 'I'm not falling out of this tree for you bastards'."

Dazed and bleeding after a tumble from his horse earlier this month, the bushie had given the horse its head in the pre-dawn dark to get him home – only to find it had taken him more than a kilometre into the heart of a croc swamp.

"I had to get off the horse and fall on the long 8ft-high swamp grass to clear a path, when I fell straight into a crocodile nest," he said.

"That spooked me. There were some monstrous tracks and the big ones are never far from the nest.

"I couldn't go back, it was too far and too dangerous, so I headed to the nearest high ground and stayed there, hoping someone would come and find me before the crocs did."

He tried everything over the next few days to attract the attention of airborne search teams, including flashing sunlight off his tobacco tin, waving his shirt on a stick and spreading toilet paper in the tree branches.

"The scrub was that thick they could not see me through the foliage. It was very frustrating – they flew within 20 feet (6m) of me at one stage," he said.

Three days into his ordeal and his food supply of two meat sandwiches was gone.

"If I hadn't seen the crocs circling me, and if I hadn't fallen into the croc nest, I would have made a push for it. But I knew the safest thing was for me to sit tight and wait."

On the eighth day of his ordeal, the missing stockman was found last Wednesday after a search involving the Australian Army, police, SES crews from Coen, Cooktown, Cairns and Brisbane and Aboriginal trackers.

"They gave me a Cherry Ripe chocolate bar after they winched me up to the chopper – it was like a gourmet meal," he said.

By Damon Guppy from The Cairns Post

October 25, 2007

This snappy crocodile was the last thing Stanley Leszczewicz expected to catch when he tried his new lure in a Portsmith drain yesterday morning.  

The 2m croc emerged from the murky water and latched on to the lure, much to the keen fisherman's amazement. 

"It went for my line but I retrieved it," Mr Leszczewicz said. "I didn't want to hook on to him." 

The croc sat on the bank as onlookers gathered at the Fearnley St drain, opposite Mr Leszczewicz`s panelbeating workshop in the centre of Cairns city, before sliding back into the water.

"He's well-fed this fella," Mr Leszczewicz said. "He's not shy." 

When Mr Leszczewicz showed the media how his accidental catch occurred, the croc resurfaced and took his
bait again. 

Workers said another croc, as big as 3m, was often seen lurking in the drain where children occasionally swam. 

That's what's going to happen here if children keep playing here," Mr Leszczewicz warned. 

"They should go to a swimming pool not swim in Fearnley Creek."

A spokesman Cairns City Council last night said the Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service would be called in to remove the croc if it became a threat.