My Treasured Tiger Photos
by Ritesh Kumar Arun
The Alpha female of Bhadra Tiger Reserve. Shot in the month of March 2012
Bandipur Tiger Reserve 2012
This guy is called Raja from the wildlife guards and naturalists of Bandipur Tiger Reserve. He is dominating the forest from past 3 years. He is the father of 12 cubs and the most interesting part here is that. This huge
male had earlier killed the legendary "Agastya" the dominant male who ruled Bandipur for almost 4 or 6 years.
Bandipur Tiger Reserve 2012
She is the current queen and the darling among the wildlife photographers. Famoulsy known as "Gauri". As above Raja and Gauri are the mating pair who have successfully raised 8 cubs till now. There was an incident where
4 of her newly born cubs were killed and the reasons are not clearly known. Some say it may be by Dholes, Some say they were abandoned and some say it was due to other male who wanted court with this girl. However of all the odds Gauri has again a proud mother
3 cubs.
Bandipur Tiger Reserve 2011
This picture was taken during the onset of Monsoon and this is the same picture of the now king of the Forest. "Raja". This was when he was pretty new to Bandipur Forest and he was wandering endlessly and was the most
spotted Tiger. Since he did not have a teritory of his own he was everywhere. Some times he was even spotted sitting next to the main roads which connect Karnataka with Tamilnadu.
Bandipur Tiger Reserve 2012
This picture is again of the same Alpha male after winning his own piece of land. This guy is a reall show stopper. I mean to say he just wont hesitate to move between vehicles. He will go in the direction which he wants
to go and he wont care if there are 2 or 3 vehicles carrying people who are just praying for a glimps of this guy. If he is out then its sure that you will be blessed for atleast 2 hrs of his time with everybody with all sorts of poses.
(Ritesh Kumar can be contacted at aurora.ritesh@hotmail.com)