For city-based wildlife photographer Ismail Sheriff, known for capturing the elusive snow leopards on camera, it was a rare honour to be invited as the only lensman to a recent conference on conservation of snow leopards in Kazakhstan.

The conference attended by delegates from 12 countries including Russia, India, Bhutan, Nepal, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Mongolia, focussed on initiating various measures to increase the population of snow leopards.

“It was indeed an honour to be there. I am glad that my adventure in Kibber (Himachal Pradesh) where I first sighted a snow leopard five years ago and subsequent sightings of the magnificent species helped me come thus far,” he tells The Hindu.

Mr. Sheriff, 39, started off on the big cat trail nine years ago, mostly photographing Royal Bengal Tigers and gradually moved on to snow leopards.

“India has about 250 snow leopards and interestingly, there are no territories for them like tigers. They often travel across about 150-200 square km, transgressing even borders of a few countries,” says Mr. Sheriff, who is into fine arts printing apart from pursuing his passion in wildlife photography.

“Unlike spotting tigers in a reserve forest, this is a different ball game altogether because the biggest challenge comes from the freezing conditions. Often, we have to brave life-threatening landslides and avalanches. It was a spine-chilling experience for me,” he explains. “But, still these factors don’t deter me as anything related to a snow leopard gives me joy,” he adds.

The maximum snow leopards, Mr. Sheriff says, are in China — about 2,000 — and it is Kazakhstan’s national animal and hence, that country’s concern for conservation is pretty much understandable.

“Groups of wild dogs pose serious threat to the leopards, especially the cubs. They also deny food to the leopards by taking away their kill. And, then there is climate change which is making the snow leopards come closer to the human habitat,” he points out.

What are the corrective measures being planned? “It has been decided to have a four km grid with trap cameras to understand their behavioural pattern, density and prey base, and educate the locals about the importance of protecting them. We generally travel to the mountain ranges during winter and by the time we have the second edition of the conference in January 2020, we should have more practical solutions to ensure an increase in their numbers,” he concludes.

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Hyderabad / by V.V. Subrahmanyam / Hyderabad – August 26th, 2019