Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2008/02/13
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]I have just returned from Kaziranga National Park and Tiger Reserve, a World Heritage Site, in the state of Assam in the North East of India. The park, probably the best run in India, holds around 75% of the worlds surviving population of the Greater One Horned Indian Rhinoceros (Rhinoceros Unicornus), as well as other threatened mammals (15 in the IUCN Red List) like the Tiger, Wild Buffalo and Barasingha or Swamp Deer. It is also home to 420 different birds. It is situated on the banks of a great, untamable river, the Brahmaputra. The ecology is based on the river flooding most of the park every monsoon - the animals go to higher ground within the park - and so with rich river silt being renewed yearly, most of the vegetation is 'Elephant Grass' which can grow as high as 25 feet. With such vegetation, the park is home to oversized herbivores such as the Elephant, Rhino and Buffalo, which are massive and have no real need to hide, and so animal sightings are frequent and plenty, which is not always true of India's wildlife parks in general. The flip side is that the grass provides terrific cover for predators, so they are extremely difficult to see. The animals and birds are also not skittish and are tolerant of humans at close distances, proof again of an effectively managed sanctuary. Equipment used was the Nikon D70 with the 80-400VR, or the Nikon D40X with the 18-200VR (from elephant back 200mm is almost too much!) Here are some of the photographs: http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand_001/kaziranga/ As usual, comments and criticism welcome. Cheers Jayanand