Photographing a tiger at night during the monsoon

It was, is and always will be a memorable experience of watching a tiger after the sun set. This time around it was the monsoon and we had been tracking the Kuraigarh male for well over 30 mins now and he had obliged most of the time by sticking to the track. Every now and then he would meander off into the brush to smell and mark his supremacy but eventually he’d come back to the track and make his way down to us.

By the time we’d seen him it had already been pouring heavily for an hour and it was getting dark very quickly. When he finally decided to call quits on his walkabout it was almost complete dark and we could barely see him leave alone photograph. But thankfully modern cameras see much more than the human eye can see and these are some of the photos and the ending clips of my video which were recorded during these final moments with the huge Kuraigarh male.

He came to what I can only identify as a roundabout in human terms but in his mind. Starting on the left he smelled, marked and rolled around on the grass leaving a good scent and then crossed over to the right to do the same. He was here for a good 10-15 mins and then finally made his way back into the brush disappearing from view. It was completely dark now and we decided to make our way back out and come back in as the night safari. The following are some of the photos from the right as he was clearly visible from where I was. The view on the left can be seen in my video where he rubs himself on the ground before getting up and leaving. Note by this time it was almost completely dark and both the photos and video were taken at ungodly ISOs to get the speeds required to freeze motion.

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