A Wildlife Adventure on the Tibetan Plateau
- simon.pugsley
- May 27
- 5 min read
Our Summer DPI competition takes place on 16th June, with the theme of Nature; a diverse photography genre encompassing wildlife, macro, underwater scenes, landscapes, seascapes, and night photography. With the nature theme in mind, I thought I’d share a day from a more unusual wildlife trip in China's Sichuan province.
Taken in December 2019, the whole trip was amazing, but this particular day was a highlight. The notes below were written whilst on the trip (channeling my inner David Attenborough!) so I would have memories from the time to go with my photos. I’ve added some notes on settings I use for wildlife photography at the end.
A Day on the Tibetan Plateau
We set off in our two vehicles at 6:30am, its dark, its cold. The crackle of the walkie talkie precedes the request for a quick temperature check. “It’s minus 15”. “Ok thank you!” comes the reply. It’s our coldest morning so far and will be our longest day out on the Tibetan Plateau. Arriving at our first location in the blue hour, we leave the warmth of the car, grab our scopes and camera equipment, and set off across the cold open plain to get into position. The huff, puff and crunch sound of our walk reflects the 3500m altitude, temperature and the frosted snow underneath our feet. Locating ourselves on a hillside, we set down our tripods and await the sun.
The silhouette of a group of Tibetan Gazelles on the hilltop opposite is our first sighting, and as the sun lights up the plain the ground appears to move before us as Pika and Snow Bunting battle for ground territory.
The Snow Bunting duel is absorbing. Carefully selecting their opponent the pair face off, head lowered, back raised, sparring back and forth within their imaginary ring, until they both rise inches off the ground to mount an aerial attack.
These duels all appear to end in a draw, and they part to find another sparring partner.
“Fox” our guide, whispers. Having the Tibetan Fox in the scope, we take it in turns to gain our first sight of this curious looking animal as our guide attempts to describe its location on a hillside with no redeeming features. We wait for movement, and as the sun sidelights its fur we all see the fox running up to the brow of the hill, before rolling onto its back and giving itself a good scratch. Transfixed on the fox, not wishing to lose sight, we follow its movement back down the hill until it stops and then pounces. Pika in mouth, it trots off across the hill and appears to bury its bounty. The Pika are the staple diet for predators on the Plateau, always on the alert heads popping up and down, and scurrying between holes.
Still buzzing from the excitement of the Tibetan Fox sighting, another call for one even closer. Bino’s, scopes and cameras instantly search the vicinity, “No, it’s a wolf, a Tibetan Wolf!”.
A few hundred metres away the Wolf crosses between us and the Tibetan Fox on the hill opposite. Wary of our presence it stops momentarily to look back at us before trotting away toward the quarry. A truly wonderful sighting.
Fingers and toes numb, but the warmth of the sun on our backs, we walk back to the cars to have some breakfast of banana, cake and coffee, whilst we chat excitedly about our early morning wildlife experience.
The rest of the day is filled with wonderful sightings of Bearded Vulture, Cinereous Vulture, Upland Buzzard, Himalayan Buzzard, and Golden Eagle, amongst many others, as we drive between locations in search of the Pallas's Cat.
A sky battle ensues later in the afternoon as a Large Billed Crow chases a Saker Falcon. The agile Saker swooping and turning to avoid the snapping large bill as the crow gains closer and closer. Colliding with bills, talons and wings the Saker reacts quicker to the aerial tumble and flies off to safety.
We take a final recce to a location where the Pallas’s cat was seen the previous month. This is what most of the group have come in the hope of seeing, and our patience and humour throughout the day is rewarded. “Pallas’s cat!” calls our driver. For the next hour we are privileged to be in the company of this extraordinary cat, as it first moves to the shelter of a rock on the hill.
As the sun lowers, its backlit fur glows. Its large eyes constantly observe its surroundings, only briefly closing as it squints toward the sun. After a while the Pallas’s cat moves slowly up the hill in stealth mode on its belly, occasionally stopping to look back toward us.
Once on top of the hill it stands proud whilst deciding which way to go. It quickly turns and disappears over the hill. A fantastic sighting.
We return to a quarry just after dusk in the hope of a mountain cat sighting but are not so fortunate this time. Our consolation is a full moon, and later a view of Venus and Saturn as the International Space Station flies overhead. A fitting close to the day spent with the wildlife stars of the Tibetan plateau.
Gear Settings and Learns
I used a Canon 7d (APS-C) and Sigma 150-600mm contemporary lens on this trip and shot in manual mode. I was wary of ISO being so high and noisy when the light was low and so set the max ISO to be 6400, as a result I ended up taking the shutter speed too low which often resulted in blur or camera shake even with image stabilization on.
For wildlife (birds and insects) photos now, I still shoot manual and fix my apertures either at F6.4 or F8 depending on the light. I only have to change the shutter speed depending on the subject and rely on Auto ISO to balance the exposure even if it goes up to 12800. I now appreciate a noisy sharper shot is better than a less noisy blurry shot. Improved noise reduction in editing software helps a lot.
If you don’t have image stabilization, a good rule of thumb is to set the shutter speed no lower than your focal length e.g. 300mm would be 1/300 etc. This will help reduce camera shake, but not subject movement blur. Increase the shutter speed further for fast moving objects, and let the ISO do its work.
When it comes to speed, taking note of the tip above, I find I use between 1/400 - 1/1000 for larger birds, both still and in flight, and the same for stationary smaller birds. In-flight smaller birds use anything between 1/1250 and 1/4000.
I also use Burst Mode with Continuous Auto Focus (I think it's called AI or AF Servo on Canons). Whilst I will have more images to review hopefully one of them will be a keeper.
Finally, rather than relying on half press of the shutter button to focus and full press to take the shot I use back button focus. I can keep my finger on the back button with continuous auto focus and then press the shutter button for a burst of shots when I’m focused. Back button focus is assigned and configured in your cameras menu system.
Please share any wildlife or nature photography tips you have in the comments or in our WhatsApp group. And don’t forget to enter the Nature competition, maximum 4 images per person and sized to the club standards.
Happy snapping!
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