Re: [Leica] Telephoto Lenses

[n.b.watson@juno.com (Nigel B Watson)]

This may be true in the physical sense; however, there are more times
than not that getting close enough to fill a 50, 90 or even 200mm frame
with a creature, the safety and well-being of either photographer, animal
or both are seriously jeopardised.  Most animals are birds have an
instinctive fear of man as a predator and are unapproachable at close
distances.   The main reason some wild animals have lost their fear of
humans is that they have been hand-fed, particularly in the national
parks.  These animals have become conditioned to equate human approach
with being fed;  if food is not forthcoming, sometimes these animals
remain cute and harmless but other times they become incensed and attack.
 Even creatures too small to inflict serious harm can carry rabies and
other serious disease.  In addition, close approach by humans has been
noted to stress certain animals to the point where they will kill or
abandon their young, or abort their natural mating instinct.  The only
exception to the above that I've encountered in 40 years of photographing
wildlife is the Galapagos, where the animals have no native predators and
therefore have no fear of humans; due to *strict* chaperoning by the
Ecuadorian park service guides, these animals have *not* been tamed by
hand-feeding.  That is the only wild setting in which I would feel
comfortable from a personal and ethical standpoint to get "in your face"
with a wild animal.  No, you're probably not going to singlehandedly
cause the extinction of a species by snapping a quick shot of a chipmunk,
and I do not mean to thrash Bud for doing so.   But the actions of
photographers have increasingly raised the ire of ecologists and
naturalists, and an adversarial relationship is developing where nothing
but cooperation should exist.   Besides, Leica can't make enough money if
they only sell those 400/2.8's to sports shooters ; )

Regards,
Nigel

On Tue, 08 Dec 1998 14:45:18 -0600 Bud Cook <budcook@ibm.net> writes:

>I won't continue to bore everyone but I wanted to point out that
>successfully photographing wild animals is sometimes simply a matter 
>of
>getting close and that you don't always need specialized equipment to
>bring back a trophy.
>
>Bud
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