Big male

Gallery: WildlifePosted April 24, 201598 views6 comments

Canon 7D, Canon 300 mm and 1.4 converter at 420mm, ISO 400, 1/400 sec.

In 2013 I went to Badhavgarh NP in India to photograph tigers. I stayed for a week and was lucky enough to see 17 tigers. Not all could be seen very well, but this big male was there on 1 early morning. We had been wating for about 45 minutes at a water hole with 5 jeeps in total. After 30 minutes 3 jeeps went to see if there was something to see somewhere else. After 45 minutes had passed we thought we might take a quick look at another water hole and if nothing was there we would come back to this one. Only about a 100 meters drive we suddenly were eye to eye with this big male. You could see he was sovereign, because he had no scratches from fights at all. We followed him back to the water hole, where he parked himself backward in the pool. For half an hour we saw him drinking, yawning and feeling fine. You could see he was aware that we were there (he one time looked straight into my lens), but wasn't bothered at all. After half an hour he went to find a cool place to sleep.

I will be posting some more images from this encounter sometime soon.

Comments

6 comments

Comment posted by Max Waugh on April 24, 2015 at 11:45 AM

Congrats on seeing so many tigers there. I completely struck out in Bandhavgarh. I like the way this guy is framed among the grasses. Though it's pretty backlit, I think the exposure is pretty good.

Max

Registered on September 26, 2008, 428 Posts, 2329 Comments

Comment posted by Jim Erhardt on April 24, 2015 at 6:10 PM

Excellent portrait and I too like what the grasses add to the photo. I'm on the fence about the comp, specifically not panning to the right to get the entire tiger in the frame, but overall this capture works quite well as is.

Good work!

Registered on November 1, 2003, 245 Posts, 2421 Comments

Comment posted by Jim Gavin on April 25, 2015 at 12:46 AM

I like the positioning of the tiger and the exposure. What is the object that looks to me like a ring in his mouth? Or am I just seeing things?

Registered on August 14, 2008, 293 Posts, 1250 Comments

Comment posted by Betty-Lou Luyken on April 25, 2015 at 11:47 AM

Thanks for your comments. This shot was taken pretty quickly as he suddenly appeared in front of our car. No time to change lenses or even change camera and my lens was too long to get the whole tiger. I did get him as a whole later though.

The thing in his mouth isn't a thing. It's just his spit.

Registered on July 9, 2007, 17 Posts, 82 Comments

Comment posted by William Bickle on April 26, 2015 at 2:23 PM

Hello Betty Lou

Well captured and interesting narrative about the encounter. Patience can be a reward!

Cheers

Bill

Registered on June 13, 2011, 183 Posts, 1702 Comments

Comment posted by Jagdeep Rajput on April 28, 2015 at 8:27 AM

I liked it as presented, very pleased with the cut you have given it.

Full open eyes give it nice appeal.

Jagdeep Rajput

Registered on April 29, 2008, 686 Posts, 2857 Comments