and once the ghara is developed. The ghara is apparently used to indicate sexual maturity, as a sound resonator when bubbling underwater or for other sexual behaviours. Courting and mating starts by mid-February at the end of the cold season. In the dry season, reproductive females observed in the Chambal River routinely move and join female breeding groups to dig nests together. They select sites in riverside sand or silt banks located between away from the water and above a water level of . These nests are deep with a diameter of about . Between end of March and early April, they lay 20–95 eggs. A record clutch with 97 eggs was found in Katarniaghat Wildlife Sanctuary. The eggs are the largest of all crocodilians and weigh an average of . Each egg is long and wide. After 71 to 93 days of incubation, young gharials hatch in July just before the onset of the monsoon. Their sex is most likely determined by temperature, like in most reptiles. Females dig up the hatchlings in response to hatching chirps, but do not assist them to reach the water. They stay at nesting sites until monsoon floods arrive and return after monsoon. Captive male gharials observed in the 1980s did not participate in guarding nests. A captive male gharial was observed to show an interest in hatchlings and was allowed by the female to carry hatchlings on his back. In the Chambal River, females were observed to stay close to nest sites and guard young gharials until the shoreline was flooded. VHF radio tracking of a junior male gharial revealed that he was the dominant male guarding nests at a communal nesting site for two years. Development Hatchlings range from in body length with a weight of . In two years, they grow to a length of and of in three years. Gharials hatched and raised in Nepal's Gharial Conservation and Breeding Center measured and weighed at the age of 45 months in April 2013. They consumed up to of fish per individual and month. By the age of 75 months, they had gained in weight and grown reaching body lengths of . Young gharials in their first year of age hide and forage in shallow water preferably in sites that are surrounded by debris of fallen trees. A study along a stretch of the Chambal River revealed that juvenile gharials up