I love this discussion. This is shaping up as a very interesting conversation and the tone and logic is compelling me to examine my beliefs and prejudices (if any). This is a far cry from the heated discussions that happen most of the times with each party sticking to their guns.
First of all, my premise of ethical vs unethical behaviour stems from my belief that we should not subject wildlife to stress. I believe a photograph is not more important than the well being of the subject. I also believe that all of us are intruders in the wild places. We should respect wildlife and allow them the space to go about their routine affairs. Having said that, we can examine what can be construed as ethical and unethical.
I am aware of people trying to imitate the calls of birds and animals. When I was a kid, I used to imitate the call of a cuckoo. The cuckoo used to respond angrily and progressively raise the pitch of its call. Finally, after a number of calls it used to end up with a high pitched coo. As a naughty boy, I used to enjoy it and used to boast that I could shut up the sweet calls of the cuckoo. That was some 28-30 years back. I know that lot of birds are inquisitive and try to come out to investigate when they hear a sound. Animals also do the same thing, some animals being more inquisitive than others. In India, hunters used to employ this technique. I had never employed this technique to bring out birds or animals from the bush to a better position for photographing. In January, I was touring Malaysia and in one of the locales I found a photographer using this technique to bring out a bird.
Let us think whether this impacts the subject:
• By doing this, are you harming the bird or animal?
• Are you causing stress to the bird or animal?
• Are you frightening the bird or animal?
• Are you changing the behaviour pattern of the bird or animal?
• When you photograph the bird by bringing it out of the bush or cluttered background, does the image depict authentic behaviour?
• I saw a photographer’s partner flushing out birds for him to shoot. Is it ethical?
I am wondering what will be going on the minds of the photographer who is waiting silently for a bird to come out, whereas another photographer is making some noise or in the extreme case literally breaking into a song and dance to entice the bird. You are an expert on birds and wildlife photography. I think it will be better to hear your perspective on what impacts the subject.
Photographing from a vehicle: Impact on wildlife
I have observed that normally animals and birds are not afraid of the vehicle. However, when they see a human being on foot, they run away. In some of the forests where poaching of wildlife is prevalent, they are wary of human presence and are likely to maintain a greater distance from your vehicle. In any case, if you are driving fast the wildlife is more likely to be disturbed than a slower approach. There is a fight to flight distance for the wild animals. The wildlife would maintain a minimum distance from people. They are likely to runaway when this distance is breached. Mostly, they flee towards deeper forests. If you happen to startle a wild animal by somehow managing to suddenly approach very close to them, and if they perceive you to be blocking their path, then you are most likely to be attacked. Most of the times, it is a mock charge. The intention is to scare you. Last year, I bumped into an elephant before dawn in a narrow winding road. It showed its irritation by trumpeting and then came charging towards me. I had to reverse for about 15-20 meters before the elephant decided that it was enough.
With adequate knowledge of animal behaviour, if you are careful, then you can move closer to animals. Most of the times the animals will accept your presence. They will peacefully go about their routine business allowing you to photograph to your hearts content. Knowledge of animal behaviour helps in understanding whether you are disturbing them or not. There have been number of occasions when the tiger has walked past my open vehicle, within touching distance without worrying about me. I don’t think I was disturbing the tiger at all. At times tourist vehicles try to block the path of the tiger. The first reaction of the tiger in those instances is to stop in its tracks and sit down behind a bush. It allows the vehicles to pass. The tourists get more time to photograph. At times, the tourists push their luck and are attacked. Once, a tourist from France, patted a tiger on its back (Old habits die hard!). It is needless to say that the tourist was severely mauled. He recovered after a painful six months of hospitalization. I am thoroughly against all such practices. And definitely I can't the back patting (bottom pinching) stuff. :D
In my initial years, I used to look directly into the eyes of the tiger, and after sometime the tiger used to turn its head to avoid eye contact. I had no idea that staring directly into the eyes of the tiger will be construed as aggressive behaviour. During my MBA education, our communications professor was always insisting on eye contact. I never knew I had to unlearn some of those training in the forests. :) Looking through the lens is not seen as aggressive behaviour. In fact you can easily hide behind your huge camera and lens.
Once, my friend and I were sitting on the banks of a narrow stream. I had my camera and tripod in front of me. On the opposite side of the stream was a hill and right opposite to us was a game trail, frequently used by wildlife to come to water. A group of deer, known as Cheetal (Axis axis) came down to the water. We were completely in the open. We could see the deer from a distance. I whispered to my friend to remain still. The deer came and stooped about 25 feet away from us on the other side of the bank. I had hidden my face behind the camera and lens. We didn’t move and were breathing softly. The deer leading the herd was looking at us intently with its tail erect and front leg raised. When the deer is alarmed it raises it tail and stamps its hoof on the ground to raise an alarm. I noticed that the deer were looking at her and not at me. After some time, I slowly moved my camera from horizontal to vertical position. This attracted the attention of the deer. However, they quickly shifted their gaze from me to her. She didn’t move at all but was looking directly into the eyes of the deer. That was making the deer nervous. The deers were moving couple of paces towards us and then retracing their steps. They knew something is not right but were fooled because we were not moving. This episode lasted for a good 20 minutes. Finally the deer took fright due to some movement from us and moved 20 meters downstream to drink water. It is evident from this episode, that if you look directly at animals through the lens, then they won’t be frightened. The direct eye contact is broken and the animal doesn’t feel threatened.
I agree that the burning problem before us is protection of the habitat. Habitat destruction is one of the primary reasons pushing wildlife towards extinction. We may debate to finetune our definitions about ethical approach to photography but we should not stand divided in our fight to protect Wildlife and Nature.
PS: I am called by lot of names. Saby, Sabya, Tiger etc etc. Sabyasachi is the name of our mythological hero Arjuna. He could shoot arrows using both his hands with equal ease.
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