Animals of India #40 : Romance in the rains - Bengal Tiger - Part one

In this thrilling four part series, walk with us into the Tadoba wilderness to witness a rare wildlife spectacle. This wildlife experience gave us the opportunity to observe Tiger behavior during their courting period and has been yet another cherished moment that we will remember for a long, long time.

It is said that the monsoon season is not a particularly good time to visit wildlife parks since wildlife sightings are far and few and the perpetually wet conditions is not conducive for photography. We tend to disagree here since we have had some of our best sightings during the monsoon season.

On the first day of our trip into the Tadoba Wildlife Sanctuary, we narrowly missed sighting a pair of courting Tigers. After seeing the photographs taken by another group of tourists, we felt disappointed on having missed the golden opportunity. But not for long, since we knew that courting Tigers tend to stay together for 3-4 days during the mating period.

The next day morning, we had a fleeting glance of the male Tiger whose territory had been trespassed by another rogue male Tiger, which was seen courting the Tigress. This fellow did not look particularly happy about it.

During the afternoon safari, we came to the same area and were greeted by the courting pair of Tigers, who were sitting in tall grass about 50m from the Road. Our excitement knew no bounds! As we quickly got ready to photograph them, the skies opened up and it started raining cats (!) and dogs.

It has always been our dream to photograph Tigers against a lush green background and we made most of the opportunity in spite of the torrential downpour and we hope to relive the experience through this 4 part series.

This massive Tiger does not look not very happy having been spotted by us and his expressions left no doubt about his state of mind! This image shows you the romancing pair sitting amidst tall grass whom we chanced upon during the evening safari. The huge male Tiger is to the left and the Tigress is partially seen to the right of the frame.The male Tiger was restless given the proximity of humans; there were about 10 odd jeeps witnessing this Wildlife moment. It was not just us humans watching them. They were also being watched by the male Tiger of this territory; the last but one image shows you the uneasy glance the rogue Tiger was giving in the general direction of the resident Tiger.Photographing courting Tigers is torrential downpour is an unique experience that cannot be described in words. All images in this Part 1 of the series have been photographed with the D300, 300mm f2.8 lens mounted on a mono pod.