Mike Dixon

CHAPTER 42
Dutchman
avid helped Daryl cut up the big shark and put it in
D the freezer. The fish joined a miscellany of kangaroos,
wild pigs and dingoes. Some looked like they‟d been
shot. Others had the appearance of road-kill victims and he
wondered if they had died accidentally or been run over on
purpose.
Daryl spoke knowledgably about conversion ratios. As far
as David could make out the term referred to the amount of
feed you had to give to an animal to get it to marketable
size.
If Daryl was to be believed, the ratio was particularly good
for crocs because they were cold-blooded and didn‟t waste
food keeping warm. Instead, they used it for building up
body mass and the occasional burst of activity when they
copulated or went off in search of a bite to eat. As a conse-
quence you could increase the capital value of your stock for
relatively little current expenditure.
David guessed Daryl was reciting from something he‟d
read on a web page. If it made any sense it applied to the
owners of chook farms who needed to dispose of rotting
chicken carcasses and other unwanted offal. It didn‟t refer to
Daryl‟s operation. The cost of refrigerating the carcasses was
far more than the crocs would ever fetch.
The owners of the property were paying for Daryl‟s lunatic
scheme. David guessed they knew what was going on and
had their own reasons for putting up with the nonsense. He
remembered the conversation he had overheard in the roof.
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