Me and my croc: Trevor Sullivan sells property with 11 pet crocs

Trevor Sullivan is selling 80 acres of land, but with it comes 11 crocs, two death adders, and a weed-smoking ghost. Here’s what life is like in his slice of paradise.

“Crocs are like dogs, they come when you call them.”

When Trevor Sullivan calls for Shah the 106-year-old croc knows it’s time for a feed.

The 4.7m beast drags himself from the water at the sound of his name – meaning ‘King’ in Persian – and waits with a lolling tongue for Mr Sullivan to drop pieces of a freshly-killed boar into the croc’s gullet.

The ancient animal lost half of his bottom jaw in a brawl with another male some time ago and can no longer pick his food up.

Mr Sullivan said he brings a “good-sized boar” to Shah and his 10 other crocs each week.

“What better way to get rid of a pest? For the first time in their life, they’re useful,” he said.

He likened the engine of his dusty quad to a “dinner bell” for his beloved pets.

Big Jack chows down on a fresh pig leg. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

Mr Sullivan said daughter Marrakai sometimes called Big Jack – her father’s second-biggest croc – “brother”.

He said the 21-year-old croc came home the same day as his new baby girl.

“My daughter decided to be born, we took my son to the crocodile farm to keep him busy while that was happening,” Mr Sullivan said.
“He walked out with a little baby hatchling saltie, wheeled it out in his pram.
“He was three at the time.”

Banjo sits near one of the Eva Valley property’s idyllic creeks. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

Part of the Eva Valley property’s charm is the unusual company.
Mr Sullivan said there were rumours a ghost – who favoured the high of marijuana and wore suspenders with a Panama hat – roamed the mango farm.
“We don’t know the history of who was here before us, this is an old place,” he said.
“When (our neighbour) was living there, she said the said the same – he’d visit and every now and then she’d smell the smoke, this gunja smoke.
“I don’t smoke and my partner don’t smoke, and every now and then we get a whiff of it in the shed, so it’ll be, ‘oh he’s back’.”

Little Jack hides in the water after lunch. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

Mr Sullivan said letting go of his 80-acre property would be “painful”, but he hoped his beloved pets – included in the sale of his home – would live long and happy lives with a family of young wildlife warriors.

He hoped the “Indiana Jones type with a bit of backbone” would take over the wildlife sanctuary.

Trevor Sullivan holds up a cast iron pan Big Jack destroyed as a young croc. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

“These crocs are going to outlive me big time, and if something happens to me – I’m sitting at 60 now – what’s going to happen? The government will come in and get rid of those guys,” Mr Sullivan said.

“The world’s changing now, we’re looking at conservation more as an important way of life and also for our survival.

“Learning to coexist with animals is better than cleaning them out.”

He said he was only taking his dogs and personal items with him when he took off for his next adventure, leaving behind furniture, fish tanks, and a pair of death adders he gifted his partner on Valentine’s Day.

Originally published as Me and my croc: Trevor Sullivan sells property with 11 pet crocs