Il tuo carrello è vuoto
In 2018 I started planning a trip in India to photograph the queen of the jungle: the Bengal Tiger.
The Bengal Tiger is a subspecies of Tiger (Panthera tigris tigris) which lives in India, Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Myanmar and in China (southern Tibet); it is a powerful feline, up to three meters long (90 cm are the tail), is 90-95 cm high at the withers and weighs over 250 kg. In the wild it lives up to 16-18 years. As it prefers to ambush its preys, the habitat it prefers is that of the forest, even if it is found in the cold areas of the Himalayas and in the swamps. Its preys are mainly ungulates, monkeys, wild pigs, but it does not disdain smaller preys; it hardly attacks humans, even if, due to the anthropization of the wild areas, the attacks have become more frequent, especially in Bangladesh, where it is estimated there are about 100 attacks a year.
Needing a lot of space, tigers lead a solitary life and mainly meet for mating which takes place during the spring. In India, its presence is confined to the large national parks where it is protected and studied.
In May 2019, with three other friends, sharing the same passion, we went to central India to visit three National Parks (Pench, Khana and Bandhavgarh) which, in addition to being close enough, gave us the best guarantees to be able to photograph, with a little luck, a large number of tigers and also many other animals. Arrived with a scheduled flight to Delhi in about three hours by car we arrived to Pench; the roads in India are terrible, not only for the conditions of the road surface but for the indiscipline of the drivers, so it is essential to rent a car with a driver who guarantees a more safe journey.
Pench National Park is located in Madhya Pradesh and takes its name from the river that flows from north to south and divides the park into two almost equal halves, eastern and western, it is one of the most famous nature reserves in India and is covers an area of 758 sq km. Protected since 1965, it became a National Park in 1975 and, since it is home to a large number of tigers, was named Tiger Reserve in 1992 and is included in the Tiger Project. In addition to the tiger, among its fauna stand out: jackals, peacocks, wild dogs, wild pigs, sloth bears, Indian leopards, foxes, striped hyenas, langur monkeys, various ungulates, Indian wolfs….
Rudyard Kipling tooks inspiration from the beauty of this jungle for his masterpiece "The Jungle Book".
As in the other parks that we have seen, only a small part of the protected area can be visited, while the rest of the park is available to the animals and the researchers who study them. Tourist access is strictly regulated and only two safaris per day are allowed: the first at 5.30 a.m. for about 5 hours and the second from 3.30 p.m. until sunset. For those who wish, there is also the possibility to stay inside for the whole day, but the cost is high.
At the entrance, one immediately has a strange and, in some ways, worrying sensation: in front of the gates of the park, as opening hours approach, dozens of jeeps pile up full of simple tourists and photographers; this suggests large gatherings and the impossibility of quitely photographing the animals, but it is only a sensation, first of all because there are so many paths in the parks and then because each jeep is assigned a path that it is not possible to leave, this guarantees a good visitors distribution. Of course, when the tiger is found, the tam tam of the drivers is such that in a few moments many cars arrive at the place of sighting. It happened to us only once to get stuck between the jeeps piled up due to the presence of a female with two puppies. Each vehicle has a driver and an assigned park guide who is in charge of identifying the animals and enforcing the rules of conduct to ensure full respect of them, animals always take precedence over vehicles. With a slightly higher cost, we took two jeeps, each with two photographers, one in front and one behind, in order to guarantee each of us the possibility of moving from right to left to easily photograph.
Due to the vastness of the territory and the thick forest, easily identifying and photographing the tiger is not a foregone conclusion: in fact in Pench we done 9 safaris inside this park and unfortunately we saw only few tigers (3 or 4), even if, according to the our guide, in that period an anomalous situation was taking place with the particularly "shy" felines and very difficult to meet. However, we have not been with idle cameras and the species captured were still many: Nilgai antelopes, spotted deer, Sambar deer, Indian boars, gray langurs, several Cuons or Asian wild dogs, the only encounter with a sloth bear, the sighting of an Indian leopard, jackals and of course many birds including the ubiquitous and beautiful peacock whose call echoes under the canopy..
In the dry period, in which we were, the temperature varies quite a bit throughout the day, in fact until 8 a.m. in the morning we needed an heavy sweatshirt and during the day we even reached over 40° C. Also, being the height of the dry season and the dirt paths: dust, dust, dust…….
The emotion of the first and subsequent encounters with the tiger is a separate matter: the jeep travels along the paths slowly, along the way no trace of the tiger even if everything speaks about it, the guide scrutinizes the forest and where the sightings are more frequent, then suddenly a langur or an ungulate emits the "alarm call", the cry of alarm that can be heard hundreds of meters away, the jeep sets off at a mad run in that direction and then the forest falls into a spectral silence, nothing moves, the animals have fled, the monkeys are safe in the trees, the vehicles are still waiting and a noise, a movement and here it appears.
For us, unaccustomed people, it is not easy to catch a glimpse of her at first glance, but then her movements betray her and here she is in all her beauty and majesty, not at all intimidated or disturbed by the presence of humans (to which she is certainly used) to continue the its crossing of the forest without paying the presents the slightest attention and then, as it appeared, disappearing back into the thicket. An incredible emotion!!
Kanha National Park is located further north than Pench, still in the Madhya Pradesh region, the heart of India; located in Mandla and Balaghat districts, Kanha Tiger Reserve occupies an area of 1,949 sq km. The park was declared a forest reserve in 1879 and re-evaluated as a wildlife sanctuary in 1933, then in 1955 it was declared a national park. Much work has been done since his appointment to improve its biodiversity, scientific research, tourist accommodation and today, according to many observers, Kanha is undoubtedly the main national park of India and one of the best nature reserves in the world.
In this park we went on 6 jeep safaris and here we began to meet the tigers quite frequently and each time it was an emotion and an encounter in its own right: here we met Chota Munna, the large dominant male who occupies the best territory inside the reserve and we met him with his female, we saw him drinking with her along a stream, crossing the path ignoring the many jeeps present and disappearing into the thick of the forest. In these days we saw at least 9 different specimens, all in splendid shape, very beautiful.
Further north is Bandhavgarh National Park, India's most famous national park since 1968 and consists of a core area of 105 sq km and a buffer area of about 400 sq km with a very varies between steep, undulating ridges, woodland and open meadows. This park is known for its tiger population density which is the highest known in India (over 50 tigers) and also has the largest breeding population of Indian leopard.
We made, here too, 6 safaris and had many sightings: a female with two puppies of a few months making bath in a puddle, at 3 p.m. and disturbed by the presence of many cars, moved to a bamboo area and lay down to nurse her cubs; then the encounter with three young tigers at a distance of 3 meters from our jeep delighted us for about ten minutes, rolling around on the carpet of leaves in the forest after a probably abundant meal.
The next day we met the same tigers in a body of water drinking and bathing, playing and chasing each other for at least half hour... We also had the opportunity to glimpse a male stalking and approaching in the thick of the forest to a sambar deer, completely unaware of the presence of the predator, but which shortly before the final ambush was warned by a langur monkey causing our friend to skip dinner. In this park we sighted at least 10 specimens.
A journey full of encounters, great and unforgettable emotions that left me splendid memories.
Here are the numbers of our trip:
At least 20 tigers sighted and photographed, plus sloth bears, jackals, dholes, sambar deer, spotted deer, barasingha deer, impressive gaur, 1 leopard sighted, some birds of prey, woodpeckers, an infinity of peacocks, nightjars, common and stone curlews, vultures indians, langur monkeys and much more.