Aditya ‘Dicky’ Singh

One great thing about living in Ranthambhore is that you end up meeting some of the best nature photographers in the world. I have been fortunate and have worked with some of the biggest names in nature photography. The best time I have ever had – fun and learning – was the two months or so that I spent with Andy Rouse this year.

About a year ago I got a mail from Andy. I don’t know how he got my contact. In the mail he mentioned that he was coming to India to shoot and was vaguely interested in coming to Ranthambhore. He had asked me a few very “tricky” questions about shooting conditions in Ranthambhore basically to test if I knew what I was talking about or not. Apparently I passed the test. I doubt if he would have come to Ranthambhore if I had failed. We exchanged a few zillion mails before he finally came down in March with Tracey Rich.

Just a few months before he came down to India he had changed his entire equipment from Canon to Nikon. He was carrying 2 Nikon D3s (probably the most awesome 35 mm format DSLR that I have seen) and four lenses. His main gear was the D3 with a 200 to 400 mm Vibration Reduction lens – which I would rate as the best gear for shooting tigers. One of these days the Bill Gates foundation is going to send me a lot of money (apparently they help out the under privileged a lot) and I am going to buy this gear.

The three of us – Andy, Tracey and I – spent a week in Ranthambhore in the middle of March. We had the best tiger driver in the world – Salim Ali – who is a naturalist in Ranthambhore but had been driving a jeep here for over 20 years before he became a naturalist. He has helped make about 10 wildlife documentaries and understands Ranthambhore (besides a dozen more wildlife areas in India) better than anyone alive. And boy did we have a blast. Andy shoots amazingly well, so he obviously got some mind-blowing pictures. But what was more surprising was that me – Aditya Singh – with my humble gear and limited experience ended up getting many pictures that were in focus. He taught me how to pan – I mean he taught me but I still have not learnt it as yet. I routinely miss getting the subject in frame, keep crashing my lens against whatever is nearby etc etc – basically keep messing up. However, I have promised Tracey that one day my panning shot of a “tiger chasing a deer” is going to win the BBC wildlife photographer of the year award. One day – hopefully within this century.

Besides panning they also taught me one more really important thing – that is – to delete, delete, delete. Sorry I meant edit, edit, edit but for guys like me delete and edit is generally speaking the same thing. Just before I met Andy Rouse, I had two 500 Gigabyte hard drives that were full of RAW images. Now I am planning to sell both of them because all the decent pictures that I have will fit in a 4 Gigabyte CF card. (Anyone interested in buying two 500 GB Lacie hard drive can drop me a mail – I will sell them cheap).

There were a few things that we taught Mr. Andy Rouse (or Sandy Grouse, as we called him). One was how to do some serious beer drinking – from sunrise to sunset. If you check his profile on facebook, you will find a picture of him all painted up and slightly (actually seriously) drunk on Kingfisher beer. Guess who took that picture and guess who opened all those 20 bottles of beer – yes sir you got it right (that’s if you got Dicky Singh as the answer). That was on Holi (the Hindu festival of colours – as you would have guessed both Salim and I are great Hindus). That afternoon Tracey and Poonam (my wife – in case you did not know that – you moreons) were the only two sober people at The Ranthambhore Bagh. Salim claims that he was sober but Tracey did not think so, specially after he almost crashed the jeep a dozen times in the afternoon safari.

After a week in Ranthambhore, Tracey, Andy and I left for Kaziranga in Assam. Kaziranga was good but not a patch on Ranthambhore – nothing is a patch on Ranthambhore, when it is rocking and believe me Ranthambhore was rocking in March. Machali – the tigress who is the lady of the lakes – and her three nearly full grown female cubs were at their best.

Tracey and Andy went off to Bandhavgarh after a few days in Kaziranga, while I stayed on for another week. I had hooked up with Nik Devasar and some cool friends from the Delhi Bird Club but that’s for another post.

Towards the end of April Andy came back to Ranthambhore for another few weeks. Tracey had gone back to UK, even though I had offered her a job as the “Honorary Bar Tender” at The Ranthambhore Bagh. This time it was my study time. Andy taught me a lot of amazing things about photography. Unfortunately I can’t tell you about them since they are classified. But yes delete, delete, delete in one of them.

There are two amazing things I have to tell you about that happened in his “second coming”. One was that we finished digging three wells and their associated waterholes in Indala. Thanks to Paramo / Andy Rouse / and a few of my other friends (see my post on Indala). The picture below was taken when one of the wells sprouted for the first time (the good looking guy is me) and that night a male tiger spent the whole night in the water hole.

The second one was a friend of Andy’s – I can’t tell you his name – that’s classified too. A few hints – he is big (horizontally), loves his beer (that probably describes every second man in UK) and the big clue is that if you buy a greeting card in UK, chances are that you have made him some money. I hope you read this Mr. Big Man. Andy has threatened to be back soon. I still have to teach him how to drink Old Monk rum and I have another 4 GB card to fill. Delete, delete, delete. Did I learn anything - that’s for you to guess? All the pictures posted here were taken with Mr. Sandy Grouse, except for the one of me below. Andy took this one and I think it makes me look good. ?

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Hi all,

I got a mail from Deepa who is based in the USA. She went through my blog (www.ranthambhore.blogspot.com) and then got in touch with me. She has some ideas about saving the tigers and other wildife in India. I am attaching the mails that we exchanged. Any ideas / comments / suggestions etc are most welcome. Please copy all replies to Deepa.

Regards,

Aditya Singh

The words in italics are my replies to her queries.

?
From: Deepa dee.r.2007@gmail.com />
Date: Mon, 8 Oct 2007 21:22:01 -0400
To:
Subject: Re: tiger conservation

Hi Aditya,

This is a really long mail, so please take your time to respond!
First of all, thank you for your prompt and detailed reply — I really appreciate it.

You are being modest about your writing skills — frankly, in this case the fact that you have a blog at all is what matters. If someone wants to read up about tiger conservation in India — on the one hand, there is a lot of information out there, but at the same time there isn’t really coherent information in one place. Someone needs to distill the information and present it like you have done with the history of Ranthambhore — I am sure each reserve has a unique and interesting history, but there is no one to tell it. And you are a very entertaining writer, too. I read your blog in it’s entirety — trust me, I wouldn’t have been able to do that if it had put me to sleep

It is sad that there is so little information on wild life of India. Most of the websites are just trying to sell you a tour and a bad tour at that too. Many of these “Wild life tour operators” have no clue what they are talking about. Unfortunately the managers of the different Reserves in India do not believe in giving out information. For instance a tiger reserve like Ranthambhore does not have a website nor a brochure / map / guide book etc.

Here are some thoughts I had. Some of them will undoubtedly appear naive to you, but I’ll put them out there anyway– please give me your honest opinion on each of them :

1) LIVESTOCK COMPENSATION:

I understand that several of the human predator tensions inside the reserves have to do with the fact that the predators target livestock. You have an entry in your blog about how tigers are killed in revenge attacks during the monsoon. I read that WWF initiated a program in ‘97 around Corbett and a few other tiger national parks where farmers were compensated for the livestock killed by tigers, in order to mitigate revenge killings. This strategy has been adopted in several places around the world with success (eg. for cheetahs in Namibia, wolves and coyotes in America etc.). I wonder whether such compensation initiatives are still alive in tiger reserves and how successful they have been. Do you think such an initiative stands any chance of success at Ranthambhore? I would like to start something like this and fund it– even if we can save one tiger, that’s a huge gain… And it will probably help to build goodwill towards the tiger among the locals, which is I think is quite crucial for long-term conservation.

This will definitely work in Ranthambhore. A local NGO called Tiger Watch did this for some time but they ran out of money and since then no one has worked on it. I have seen how this works in Corbett. They give compensation for any livestock killed outside the boundary of the reserve. If the livestock is killed inside the reserve then there is no compensation and rightly because livestock is not supposed to be there. Not only will this effort save tigers directly but it will also help build a trusted network between conservationists and local villagers. There is none now. I don’t think this will take too much of funding because livestock kills are far and few but it would need an organization with at least 2 dedicated people with one phone line and an address. In other words it would take a sustained program (say at least 5 years) to make this work.

2) DEAD CUBS:
The picture you sent was truly painful to look at. Are these wells all over the reserve? I have been reading that a lot of lions have been dying in the Gir forest after falling into one of multitudes of open wells in and around the forest. Does this sort of thing happen in Ranthambhore too? Is something being done about it — building parapets around the wells or something else?

The deaths of these cubs was really sad and it could have easily been prevented. Unfortunately the Department of Forests assumes that they own the reserves and their managers are not open to any suggestions. Lesser mortals like you and me can not do anything inside the reserves, at least for a few years to come. Hopefully this attitude should change.

3) ADOPT-A-TIGER :
Has anyone tried an Adopt-a-tiger program as a fund-raising measure? I have a friend who co-founded a small, but very successful turtle conservation project in Kenya and she was telling me that an adopt-a-turtle program they started has met with a great deal of success online. I think people are more likely to give money when they feel a personal involvement with the animals they are giving to — and tigers certainly have far more personality than turtles And of course, adopt-an-animal has been used by several different organizations to raise money. There are a fairly small number of tigers at every reserve — you are probably able to identify each tiger at Ranthambhore. My point is that the more you personalize a cause, the more people care. When tigers go missing, I wish there would be a real outrage — which doesn’t seem to happen because these creature are largely anonymous (except to a few people like you on the ground). But if someone in say London had adopted Nick-Ear, when he went missing there would be increased awareness about that in places outside of Ranthambhore. I think we have to reach as far out as we can in an effort to save our wildlife.

Implementing such a project would require someone to take regular pictures of the various tigers and post them online, but it doesn’t seem too difficult to pull off….

I had thought of this after reading about it on the net.
Right now there are 31 tigers (18 adults and 13 cubs) that we know of for sure in Ranthambhore. Not a very large number at all and all of them have been photographed. People like us do not have access to the entire reserve and will probably never have that, at least not on a long tern basis. However the area that we do have access too (called the “tourism zone” - which is less than 50% of the national park) has the highest tiger density. In fact about 75% of Ranthambhore’s tigers are in this 50% of area. This area is heavily “patrolled” by “tourists” while few people if any go to the other parts. The managers of the national park admit to this in private but will not accept it in public. One sure way to rid an area of tigers is to close that area for “tourists”. You close an area and within a year or two there are no tigers there. This is because even the officials do not go in areas that are out of bound for tourists and that leaves that area open to wood cutters, cattle grazers, poachers etc.
We can easily monitor on a regular basis the tigers in the “tourism zone” and take regular pictures.
The one problem with this scheme is that who do you give the money to. I for one am not in favour of giving money to money to the Forest Department because we then have no control on how they spend it. So we can get someone to adopt a particular tiger and get them to contribute towards saving the particular tiger but we would not be able to make any efforts to enhance the protection of that tiger. Sad but that is how tiger conservation works in India. Tiger reserves in that sense are “closed” for all but a handful of people. We are not one of these handful and will probably never be. We hope this will change soon but there are no indications on the field that it will.

4) MAPS:

We need better maps to understand the scale of the human-tiger interactions: I read in the Tiger Task Force report that there are 1500 villages in core & buffer zones. That’s roughly 65,000 families and if we assume 5 members per family, that’s = 325,000 people. No way to know if this estimate is anywhere close to the real number. I have read that there are millions of people who inhabit tiger zones (I suppose most people inhabit more peripheral zones). I am interested in creating maps with the locations of as many of these villages as possible and a rough estimate of the people in each of them with a brief description of their occupations. All we need is a GPS and someone to do the data collection and input the local knowledge (such as names of villages, etc). When these villages and their inhabitants are no longer anonymous and have their own stories to tell, it will be easier to raise support. I know that WPSI has some maps, but they are quite rudimentary.

There are some good maps at least for Ranthambhore. However these are the topographic sheets that were done by the Survey of India a long time ago. These maps do not tell the real story. They give the location of villages that existed when the maps were made but do not tell us about the many villages that came up after that. Since then mapping has changed. Someone I know told me that satellite images of Ranthambhore on a 4 x 4 meter grid can be bought online. What we need are digitized maps.
A friend of mine wanted to work in Keladevi Sanctary that is part of the Ranthambhore tiger reserve doing exactly what you have in mind (and a few more things) but we could not raise the funds and probably would not even have got permission to do the research.
Even without the permissions we can do a survey of the villages and collect data like the location of the villages, the population, live stock population, a rough socio-economic survey of the population etc.

5) VOLUNTEERS:

I wonder why there are no international volunteers in tiger habitats.

You might have heard of this organization called Earthwatch. They support scientific field research projects all over the world by offering volunteers the opportunity to join the research teams. They are quite a popular and successful organization and get a fair amount of positive buzz in the media. Volunteers pay a fairly high fee for these volunteering opportunities and all their activities are funded by volunteer fees.

They don’t seem to have a presence in India and I wonder why that is (is it just Indian bureaucratic hurdles at work here?) They have a presence on every continent, and esp. in places with endangered habitats.

I don’t think any of the scientists working on their environmental projects really need so many volunteers, but that’s beside the point somewhat. Usually these volunteers are very passionate about these causes and willing to live in modest conditions and rough it out. Mostly, they act as ambassadors for the cause when they get back home and can be quite instrumental in raising awareness in their communities. In the last few years, there has been a real surge in this so-called volunteer-tourism as witnessed by several articles to that effect in the NY Times and other newspapers.

There are no volunteers for tiger conservation in India. This is purely because of bureaucratic hurdles. The volunteers would not even be allowed to get close to the reserve. There are thousands of very dedicated people in India who could do some great work as volunteers but the government would not allow them to do any work in the reserves.
Even if they are not allowed inside the Core area of the reserve they can still do some great work just outside the reserve, for which they do not need any permissions. Its just that no one has thought of co-ordinating such an effort. For instance the entire mapping could be done in one month using volunteers.

My friend (who co-founded the turtle conservation project) was telling me that when her project first got started they would have volunteers come to help (mostly from Britain during their gap year). In the beginning these volunteers were a drain on the resources of the staff members working full time on the project. But eventually the staff streamlined the process and figured out ways for the volunteers to make themselves useful. After that, the volunteers became productive members of the project — more importantly, they would spread the word around and keep the contributions coming in. They would often go back to volunteer.

I don’t see why a volunteer program cannot be started in tiger habitats. These volunteers are not a drain on financial resources since they would pay for all their expenses. And it is perfectly reasonable to make it mandatory for them to make a small donation. I can’t imagine there would be any dearth of volunteer interest in such an initiative, although it will take some time to get the word out. Some of the cheetah conservancy projects in Namibia accept applications up to a year in advance. Besides, India has a lot to offer by way of tourism….http://www.earthwatch.org

The hard part, of course, is that someone knowledgeable on the ground will have to figure out a program for them to train them and to keep them busy. I am willing to work very hard on this to put together a program, elicit applications, sift through resumes and pick the right people to volunteer. You have mentioned several wonderful people in your blog — like Dharmendra, Vakil and others, who have the know-how to put together a field program using volunteers. There might be other such people who could be employed?http://www.earthwatch.org

I think this can be done. It just needs the first push and then it can be on track for a long time to come.

So something tells me that this is very much in the realm of possibilities.I am really interested in scoping out the potential for a volunteer program. I think there is an opportunity here. But please tell me what you think.

6) MOGIYAS AND MICROFINANCE:

Your blog entries about the

The question is will the Mogiyas and the other tribes be interested in these soft loans which will enable them to cultivate alternate sources of income? I can work to put these people on the map of the micro-finance world. But I need to be convinced that this will be a useful step. I mean a KIVA-type model works when people have at least some inclination towards honesty and hard-work. So what do you think — will it work in the context of these tribal groups? I know you are involved in doing work towards rehabilitating one of these families.

Micro finance and Mogiyas – I think that could do wonders. No one has thought about doing anything for these people and they are amongst the poorest people here. Their needs are very basic but they do not even have the means to get those together. I see people here who spend on one dinner what a Mogiya family would make in a month. We would need to get the procedure right and this can really work. In fact anything that is done outside the reserve will work. Inside the reserve we have no say.

7) BLOGS:

The reason I am writing to you is entirely because of your blog. I want to think of ways to get people on the ground at other tiger reserves to participate too. Do you think there are ways to find such people and get them to contribute their experiences and knowledge? I know it’s a cliche — but the world has truly gotten smaller thanks to the internet and one can reach so many more people now than one could ever before.

A friend of mine got me started on my blog. I am not too much of an “online” person but I found this a great way to let out news from here. I strongly feel that there should be a few blogs coming out of every wildlife area in India. It does not make a difference how well it is written as long as it is written regularly.

All suggestions/comments are welcome. I am hoping to cull these thoughts down and have a few initiatives we can try. But I am really serious about doing something — this is not a passing fancy.

Thanks much,
–Deepa.

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On the 1st of October 2007 the Ranthambhore national park re opened after three months. All the Project Tiger Reserves are shut during the monsoons and likewise Ranthambhore closes on the 1st of July every year. These three monsoons months are “tough” ones for the managers of the park because this is when illegal cattle grazers storm the park with their cattle and literally camp inside the park. This year, however, like the last year, the Park management managed to keep the grazers out of the national park. There were some instances of grazing but compared to what used to go on a few years ago, such instances were insignificant. Hats off to Mr. R. S. Shekhawat and his team.

I was busy trying to set up our Lodge for the new season and did not get a chance to go to the park till the 7th of October. Between the 7th and the 12th of October, I managed to go for every safari (and there are two in a day) and boy did I have a good time.

Water availability: Ranthambhore had some great rains in the last few months and all the water holes inside the park are full to the brim. I have not seen the water in the lakes rise to this level since 2001. The park is lush green and the undergrowth nice and thick. The ungulates have had a good time for the last few months and it shows very obviously.

Tiger sightings: Till a few days before the park reopened we believed that October would not have many great tiger sightings. Mainly because we thought that since there is water everywhere in the park, the ungulates would be spread out all over the park and so would the predators. We also believed that the thick undergrowth would make tiger sightings even tougher. But this was not to be. I personally saw 10 different tigers – two families of a 4 tigers each (one in Kachida and the other in the area of the lakes) and two males.

Cubs: the forest officials have told us that at least two tigresses have small cubs (below three months of age) – one in Guda and the other in Berda. Ranthambhore is rocking again – after a span of 5 years. I just hope that the good times are here to stay for some time.

All these pictures have been taken between the 7th and 12th of October 2007.

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Planning your trip

1. Identify the subjects that you want to shoot and the best locations and the best times in the different locations to shoot them.

The first thing that you need to ask yourself is what all are you looking to shoot. Once you have figured this out then make an “Ideal Wish List” of all the shots that you want. You may never get most of them but this is a good way to start planning your trip. The next step after you have got your “Wish List” together is to identify the different locations, which would suit your purpose.

Once you have frozen the destinations that you want to visit, the next step is to find out the best seasons in the different locations for shooting your preferred subjects. At the same time you would also need to figure out how many days would you need in each of your preferred destinations to get reasonably good photo opportunities. For instance, if you want to shoot Asiatic Elephants, one week in Corbett National Park in May, will get you a lot of great pictures. However, if you went to the same Park in December, a month would not be good enough.

2. Plan your itinerary well.

A well-planned itinerary will save you a lot of time and money. The two main things that you have to plan for are:

• Travel arrangements – have to be planned so that you spend the least amount of time in transit and the maximum amount of time in the field taking pictures.

• Naturalists, Guides and Drivers – These are the people who can make or break your trip. They are your local contacts who have probably spent years in the field and know the place like the back of their hands. It is very important to have a good local team and to build a good working relationship with them, since they are the ones who arrange the shooting opportunities. Remember to tip them well and to let them know at the onset that you are going to do so. If you pay peanuts you get monkeys and you definitely do not want monkeys to guide you in the shoot.

Planning you itinerary well is easier said than done, especially if you are going to an area where you have not been before. Most of the Tour Operators and Ground-handling agents claim to know a lot about photography but very few of them actually do. One good way to find out how much your tour operator knows is to ask them specific questions and judge from the answers. You could also ask them to give you references of the photographers that they have dealt with and them cross check with the photographers.

Before your Departure, Care and Maintenance

1. Get information about your locations.

You definitely need some up to date information about all the places that you plan to visit, a few weeks before you leave for your trip, so that you come prepared. I have met a lot of people who land up with the wrong films, without beanbags etc - just because they did not have the right information. Some of the most important information that you need is:

• Light conditions - The light conditions in most parts of India are highly variable depending on the seasons. For instance, in a Ranthambhore National Park (a great place to shoot action shots of tigers) the temperatures vary from 4 degrees centigrade (in peak winters) to 45 degrees Centigrade (in peak summers) and so the light goes from really soft in winters to really harsh in summers.

• Wildlife viewing – The kind and number of wildlife that you see depends a lot on the weather conditions. Generally speaking, you can see more mega-fauna in the summers (when the light is very harsh) than in winters (when the light is fantastic).

What you need is “current information” about the different locations, just before you are leaving for the trip and not general information about the different places.

2. Find out what all equipment you would need.

• Camera bodies – I would recommend at least two camera bodies for each format that you shoot in. I personally use two digital SLR bodies and two film camera bodies) in which I load films of two different speeds – mostly 100 and 400 ISO). This really helps because when action is happening I do not have to change lenses.

• Lenses – This is tricky one but I would recommend carrying one wide angle lens, one normal lens (around 50 mm), one zoom in the range of 70 to 200 and one longer telephoto (300 mm is great for most mega fauna but may not be powerful enough for birds and lesser fauna). At least one of the two longer lenses should be a fast one (f 2.8 or 4.0). I personally prefer to carry a 17-35 mm, one 24 to 80 mm, one 120 to 300 mm Sigma f 2.8 (an amazingly versatile lens) and a 500 mm. I also carry a 100 mm macro (though I do not do too much of macro work) and a 1.4 times converter.

• Digital Cards and Hard drives and/or Laptops – If you are using digital format, you are strongly advised to carry spare memory cards and to carry a portable hard drive and/or a laptop with sufficient memory. In most of the bigger towns you can download the cards on to a CD or DVD (just ensure that the pictures are deleted from the computer that they have been downloaded on as most Indians do not understand the meaning of copyright) but it is still better to carry spare memory.

• Films or Tapes for video – Carry all the films and tapes that you think you will need. In fact it is better to carry excess. It is not advisable to buy films or tapes locally as they are usually not stored properly. In case you have to buy them in India then go to a big store in one of the big cities. Remember to carry the films and tapes in hand baggage, as the powerful X-ray machines in the airports can destroy them.

• Tripod / Monopod / Beanbags - These are probably the most important pieces of equipment that you would need. If you are going to do most of your shooting from jeeps or elephant backs then the tripods are not very useful. Monopods and Beanbags work very well if you are in a jeep. If you are on an elephant back then you have no choice but to hand hold the camera.

• Cleaning equipment – Dust is a big problem in India and you would probably have to clean the equipment every day. It is very important to carry all the cleaning equipment that you think you would need and you would need a lot of it. If you are using digital SLRs, be very careful when you change the lenses or you would end up with a lot of dust on the sensor.

• Bags – I would strongly recommend carrying one bag that fits all your equipment. It helps if you have straps on the back.

• Batteries / Chargers / Adapters – Indian electricity works on 240 volts and 50-60 Hertz and circular plug points. You may need to carry adapters for the chargers accordingly. It is recommended to carry spare batteries.

• Flash – Flash photography is not permitted inside most of the National Parks and Sanctuaries in India and in many ancient monuments. However, I would still recommend that you carry a flash, even though you may not be permitted to use them in many places.

3. Check & Clean your equipment before you leave for the trip.

Insurance for the equipment is advisable though not necessary. In case the insurance is very expensive (and it usually is), you can do without it but just be very careful especially when you are in transit. Make a list of serial numbers of camera bodies and lenses.

4. Test your equipment before you hit the field. Never (and I mean NEVER) go out to the field with untested equipment.

Some tips for nature photography in India

• Vehicles, Drivers and Guides – Most of the wildlife photography in India is done from a small Suzuki jeep (locally known as Gypsys). These are not very comfortable but are very tough and do very well on bad terrain. There is often not enough space in these Gypsys to set up a tripod (unless you remove or fold one of the two rear seats). However, beanbags are very handy if you are in one of these vehicles. Since these vehicles are small, they can at the most take 3 photographers (ideally only 2). It is very important to get a good driver, since he is the one who is going to set the angle for you. It is also very important to brief the driver and the guide (who are compulsory in most wildlife sanctuaries and parks) about the angles etc that you like (and you will have to do this).

• Best time in the day for shooting – The best light conditions are found in the early mornings and the late hours of the evenings. This is also the time when wildlife is most active. This is particularly true for summers, when the light is good only for about an hour or two in the mornings and evenings.

• Best time in the year for shooting – Generally speaking, in most parts of India, winters is a much better time to shoot than summers. In winters the light is softer, the wildlife more active and the backgrounds more colorful. However, this is a broad generalization. In summers, it is generally easier to find wildlife (this is most apt for mega-fauna like tigers, elephants, deer etc) because they tend to congregate around the few water holes that still have water.

• Dust – In most of India (especially in the wildlife areas) dust is ever present (and in large quantities). This can be tough for the equipment and it is advisable to be prepared for it. However, dust can also make for great backgrounds, particularly at dawn and dusk.

• Patience – You most probably already know about the amount of patience required in nature photography. However, I would like to add that in India you need much more of this quality than you would in other countries.

• Shooting from Elephant back – Elephant back safaris are very popular in many wildlife reserves in India (except in Western part of India). Elephants are the most marvelous off road “vehicles” and can reach almost everywhere. However, they are not very comfortable and on elephant back you have no choice but to hand hold the camera. If you are planning to do a lot of shooting from elephant back, then it is advisable to use high-speed films and lenses. Image Stabilizing (IS) or Vibration Reduction (VR) technology is very handy when you are on elephant back. Wild animals show a lot of tolerance towards elephants and elephants can get very close to wild animals, so you do not need a very large telephoto when on an elephant back. I personally think that a 70 – 200 mm f 2.8 zoom (with IS or VR) with a 400 ISO film or sensor setting is ideal for shooting from elephant backs.

• Safety of your equipment – In most of the wildlife parks and sanctuaries, your equipment is generally safe. However, I would advise you to be very careful when traveling in trains and when you are in urban areas. In such areas, stick to your equipment.

Look out for bonuses

India, with its vibrant colors, diverse culture and teeming population is paradise for photographers. A friend of mine once remarked that if you blindfold yourself, take a camera and walk down a market, taking random pictures, you can end up with a few great shots – that is you do not get run down. India offers a lot of great photo opportunities in every day life. Take advantage of this and look out for bonuses. Even if you are going to a Nature reserve for photography do not miss the brilliant opportunities that you will get in railway stations, roads, markets etc. I would recommend that you keep a camera handy all the time.

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