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Tip o' the Day

"Never shoot from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m."

"Seek wildlife subjects that are conditioned to human presence."

"Make sure there's a glint in the eyeball of your subject."

"Photograph people with wildlfie when possible."

All the above advice came from a few of the best wildlife photographers in America. It was during a panel on "Wildlife Photography" at a convention of Outdoor Writers Association of America, back in the 1980s (before digital cameras). I shrugged, smiled in chagrin, and sighed.

There was a time when I would've scribbled furiously at each pearl of wisdom falling from those photographers' lips (I once dreamed of becoming a successful wildlife photographer). That dream -- like a few others -- was discarded when facing reality: that my dogged pursuit of another way of life clashed with making a success of wildlife photography.

At the time of that OWAA annual convention I'd worked as an outfitter and guide in the Bob Marshall Wilderness for nearly two decades, and had been writing newspaper columns about those adventures for six years. Too, I'd photographed and written a coffee table book about that wilderness. But my occupation did not permit exercising the kind of patience necessary for becoming a photographer of wild creatures. To capture wildlife on film, a photographer's first commitment is to his photograph. In my primary occupation, my first commitment had to be the guests I was leading to adventure.

I sighed again. All those top photographers said they seldom use a normal camera lens (55mm). Instead, they use telephoto lenses to 400mm. But the higher-powered lenses are used only with a tripod or stock-mounted support device. Each sometimes shot from blinds -- usually ones they build themselves, going to considerable effort to construct a blend-with-the-surroundings way to stay hidden near a waterhole, meadow, or major game crossing.

Obviously the 10-to-3 edict is to avoid the flat light of midday.

Seeking wildlife subjects conditioned to human presence means shooting for the most part in National Parks or Wildlife Refuges.

The glint-in-the-eye injects life in the animal, but it doesn't mean not shooting a pack of wolves battling a grizzly bear just because you can't get them to stop long enough to capture the glint.

Three years later Jane and I sold our guide service and most of our horses and tack. I remembered the old dream, purchased two top-of-the-line Nikon camera bodies and a powerful variable lens to 200mm, then set out to add support photos to magazine pieces cranked out regularly to America's top outdoor magazines. It wasn't long, however, that I noticed something: the magazines were buying my stories, but they always used someone else's photographs.

My conclusion? Photographers should photograph, writers should write. And never the twain should meet.

 

GUN ACCIDENTS -- THE HARD LESSON!

 

The lessons are hard, but necessary. Fortunately, the truth is that most accidental gun discharges are caused by novice gun-handlers and result in no bodily injury to humans. Usually there's little property damage and all too often individuals shrug off the unexpected discharge as a mistake "with no harm done." But professionals--law enforcement personnel, professional guides, soldiers--tend to take a different, more jaundiced view.

One accidental discharge is all I can recollect during my guiding years. But one is light years more than none, and zero tolerance is the only goal for which a hunter must strive.

I'm not sure what happened, but it occurred in a tiny covered breezeway between our camp's sleeping tent and cooktent. I was in the latter, cleaning up after breakfast; hunters and guides were preparing to depart for the day's hunt. Most were collecting gear in the sleeping tent. One nimrod was apparently checking his rifle--he said he wasn't loading it, but that's questionable.

The gun roared! It did so in a confined four-by-six space; only tent fabric separated the .300 magnum's muzzle from all of the camp's other human occupants. Horses stamped nervously at hitchracks, or ran snorting in the corral just beyond the tents.

I burst through the tent flap, terror-stricken that someone had been shot. Just as I burst from the cooktent, one of our other hunters flung the sleeping tent flap aside. "Who did that!" he screamed.

The man who'd caused the accidental discharge stared stupidly at his weapon. He seemed to shrink, near tears, thrusting the gun first at me, then at his companion. "I . . . I don't know what happened. It just . . . just went off!"

"You idiot!" the other hunter screamed. "You bloody, blithering idiot!" He looked at me. "Are ou all right?" Then he remembered his best friend. "Jim! Jim! Are you all right."

Jim pushed into the alcove. "What happened?" he asked.

I looked for the bullet's path. There was a hole in the soil, at the man's feet, perhaps a foot ahead of his toes. Clods of dirt had been blown up on the woodpile that occupied half the alcove. It was obvious the gun handler had at least held the rifle's muzzle in a precautionary direction.

The man's face still flamed scarlet. "It wasn't me," he said. "The gun . . . it was the gun. Somehow it fired."

I gazed beyond. The faces of the other hunters and their guides shined in the burgeoning morning light. "Is everyone all right?" I asked. Murmurs of assent were returned. All were accounted for.

What are you going to do?" the angry hunter demanded, meaning by his question that I should visit some terrible wrath on the errant hunter. For his part, the guy who'd blasted a hole in the dirt stared up in anguish, apparently expecting punishment for an infraction that I was ill-equipped, either by inclination or experience, to handle.

I walked out to greet the dawn. "Reckon the elk will think we're so desperate for meat that we're shooting ourselves amongst the tents?" I mused.

"Come on Joe," one of the guides murmured, "shake it off and let's get a move on." Joe stared long and hard at me, then pushed on out of the alcove, moved some distance away, and carefully jacked the remaining shells from his rifle's magazine. When he finished, he again stared at me, then strode to his waiting horse and slipped the magnum into its saddle scabbard.

After guides and hunters had ridden from camp, I returned to my dishpan with plenty of time to think:

It was a lesson that could've gone either way.

 

Roland Cheek wrote a syndicated outdoors column (WildTrails and Tall Tales) for 21 years. The column was carried in 17 daily and weekly newspapers in two states. In addition, he scripted and broadcast a daily radio show (Trails to Outdoor Adventure) that aired on 75 stations from the Atlantic seaboard to the Pacific Ocean. He's also written upwards of 200 magazine articles and 12 fiction and nonfiction books. For more on Roland, visit:

 

www.rolandcheek.com

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