Atul Dhamankar

Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve is very close to my heart since my childhood. I spent over 25 years in this forest for study and photography of Tigers & other Wildlife. I am a full time freelance wildlife researcher, wildlife writer and Wildlife Photographer. I have written 12 popular wildlife books including a photographic "Field Guide of MAMMALS and BIRDS of TADOBA TR". I also visited to superb forests like Ranthambhore & Bharatpur in Rajasthan, Kanha, Bandhavgarh & Pench at M.P. Sunderban in W. Bengal, Jim Corbett in Uttarakhand, Gir, Little Runn of Kutch & Velavadar in Gujrat, Kaziranga, Manas & Dibrusaikhow in Assam, Namdapha in Arunachal Pradesh, Anamalai in Tamilnadu, Daroji in Karnataka of India. I captured thousands of wildlife images in these jungle. Since last 28 years, I was studying tigers in Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve (TATR). I have many thrilling experiences & encounters with tigers. In 1990' s, I always searched for tigers walking on foot with forest dept.'s trackers, guards and officials. So many times I got signs like dropping, scrape marks, pug marks, which are very useful to track the tiger and identify his territory, prey animals, breeding & behavior pattern. I had seen tigress gave birth to the four cubs and rearing them to adult many times in this superb forest. That was a indicator of good, healthy and ideal Eco-system of TATR, which provide this big cat all essential things like nice prey base, adequate water and disturbance free forest. I frequently saw many tigers in forests around TATR, which is now buffer zone. Many times in past I was encountered with TATR's tigers and spent hours, days and months to their observations. I also work with Wildlife Conservation Society, USA, on tiger camera trapping, Line transect Survey, Scat encounter survey, which was done by various sophisticate equipment.