Tiger Trap

To answer several of you at once (thanks for asking) - the project in India I was working on is called Tiger Trap; so I've titled it for the moment. It is my first major overseas endeavor since returning to photography and writing full-time; it is a self-assignment. Like most of the projects I have worked on previously, it relies heavily on contacts I have developed over the years, and subjects or species, that I have a keen interest in seeing explored from a perspective I think has been neglected.

Tiger Trap follows project leader Dr. M Firoz Ahmed and his team of researchers in Kaziranga National Park, in Assam, India. The team is with the conservation organization Aaranyak, based in Guwahati.


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As is painfully the case in many of the endangered species stories I have researched and photographed, the cost and state of affairs become sad reminders of our planet and the life on it. Just over a century ago there were an estimated 45,000 tigers living wild in India's forests. By the time hunting was banned in 1972, their numbers were down to 2,000. Over the past century, the world's population of tigers has been reduced by 95% as a result of hunting and poaching for their body parts, which are used in traditional Asian medicine. As we celebrate The Year of the Tiger there are only around 3,200 tigers left on the planet.

A bit more about the project and updates will be posted on my website at http://gerryellis.net/tigertrap.html

Tiger Trap Photo: ARNYK_KNP_Female20 (courtesy Aaranyak - not to be reproduced without permission)