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Crocodiles have always seemed like nature’s a-holes – opportunistic predators that will eat nearly anything that crosses their path.  Scientists may, however, have spotted the first signs of “cross-species empathy” from these scaly thugs.

A report published in the Journal of Threatened Taxa outlines how a young dog was observed being chased by a pack of feral dogs and entered the shallow waters of the Savitri River, in India’s Maharashtra.

The poor dog had not spotted the three crocodiles floating nearby, who slowly began edging closer to what appeared to be certain prey.

Normally the crocs would have been too happy to eat a doggy lunch, but to the scientists’ amazement, the scaly batards instead pushed the dog to safety using their snouts, guiding him to an area of the riverbank that wasn’t occupied by the feral pack, and allowing the dog to make a safe escape on land.

The bizarre behaviour has led to the authoring of the report, stating it is possible proof of “sentient behaviour suggestive of cross-species empathy”.

Empathy is not a word usually associated with crocodiles – especially three of them – even though the report acknowledged that the crocodiles’ kindness may simply have been due to their lack of appetite.

“Given that the mugger was well within the striking range and could have easily devoured the dog, yet none of them attacked and instead chose to nudge it towards the bank, implies that the hunger drive was absent,” it read.

The report’s conclusion however chose to focus on the heartwarming part of this encounter.

“We propose this to be a case of sentient behaviour of the crocodiles resulting in cross-species ’emotional empathy’, which is not a very extensively investigated behaviour.”

The curious case of a dog ‘rescued’ by the group of crocodiles reported here seems more along the lines of empathy than altruistic behaviour. However, there is little research on such mental faculties of reptiles.

The report further stated that “Though crocodiles are generally stereotyped as lethargic and lacking social interactions except for territoriality, parental care and prey ambush, they demonstrate discrete behavioural repertoire in a variety of situations suggestive of refined cognition.”

So the nightmarish creatures might just have a heart.

This is a unique case, so it will definitely require some more study. In the interim, we don’t suggest you try to cuddle the next crocodile you might see. They might not have had a big lunch yet, and as noted, they can be real a-holes sometimes.

[source:sky&threatenedtaxa.org]