Course of Nature: If you are quiet and well-behaved, nature will come to you

Hides are usually small, dark, well-camouflaged and located next to waterholes, or in the form of a machan or watchtower set up on a tree overlooking a nest or a kill. You creep in, get used to the dimness, check out the peepholes, set up your cameras and try to make as little noise as possible in that cramped space. You will, almost immediately, learn whether mosquitoes want to marry you or not. Better than spraying yourself with highly pungent mosquito repellent, try something indigenous such as neem, or if the weather permits, just button down and collar up. If it’s birds — especially waterfowl — that you’re after, you will notice that you will have been spotted well before you enter the hide, and the birds will swim away to the farthest end of the water-body, quacking derisively as they sail away. One old trick to foil this is to have a companion along, who accompanies you into the hide and then leaves, fooling the silly birds into believing that the coast is clear, because they never learned to count in kindergarten. All very well, except you need someone who’s willing to do that for you. The second option is simply to wait… because as they never paid attention in kindergarten, most waterfowl have very short memories and attention spans and will have soon forgotten that they saw you enter.

You can only grin maliciously as they paddle blithely towards you, sometimes drifting so close you feel you can reach out and touch them. You can eavesdrop on every quacking piece of gossip, and discover shocking truths about them (Drakes may be handsome dudes but are violent chauvinists and will virtually drown duckies while mating). What gives you an even bigger kick is that these are wild waterfowl, well used to dodging shotgun blasts and here you are, eavesdropping on their intimate secrets!

Hides near waterholes or over kills can teach you a lot about animal bathing, drinking and dining etiquette. Usually, the rules are simple: smaller creatures give way to larger. Peafowl honking or langurs suddenly hawking, causing all the other creatures to stampede away, means, hold your breath, a big cat may be approaching. On hot summer days, elephants may come down to shower and splash and mud-bathe (rhinos, buffaloes and wild boar also love a long, languorous mud-wallow at the spa). They will sniff the air suspiciously with their trunks — and heh-heh — keep in mind that they can huff and puff and blow down that hide of yours with no effort at all! So keep quiet and keep still. Wild elephants have been billed as the most dangerous and unpredictable animal in the jungle. Even those clumsy, snuffling sloth-bears are notorious for their incandescent tempers, so if they come shambling out of the forest and figure out where you are… yes, it’ll make your day!

There will be long periods when ostensibly there’ll be nothing to see. Not true, because there’s always something going on. If not with birds and animals, then with insects and reptiles. Watch dragonflies zither glassily over the water, or clouds of kaleidoscopic butterflies gather to suck up moisture from mud or dung. Whirligig beetles will skate around maniacally, but never crash, and then, what’s that fluttering over the waterhole swishing a long white fairy tail — a paradise flycatcher hawking hoverflies! Even closer, that green stem you thought was a creeper, suddenly has beady hooded eyes — it’s a vine snake holding still, waiting in ambush like a professional assassin.

Sure, there are disadvantages to watching wildlife from a hide. Usually, the first 15 minutes to half-hour are the most difficult; you are restless, cramped, insects are declaring their undying love for you, and it’s usually hot and sticky. Also, you’ll always get the feeling that the action is happening just out of your line of sight — which is limited. You can’t move around much and you’ll make too much noise, and when there’s nothing happening outside, you’ll find yourself navel gazing (perhaps, not such a bad thing in these frenetic times. Also, you might be surprised by what comes crawling out)!

And then, imperceptibly, matters settle down. I’ve always held that instead of trying to go to nature, you should let nature come to you. If you are quiet and well-behaved, it will, even if it takes its time about it. Just as you’re beginning to give up, there’ll be an explosion of action: a kingfisher spearing a fish that’s not going down easily, elephants causing mini-tidal waves as they bulldoze into the water, deer stepping out timorously, a crested serpent eagle bringing its baby a still-writhing rat snake, wild boar bogeying their bums against rocks to get rid of itches, and best (and probably rarest) of all, peafowl trumpeting the arrival of a tiger or leopard — and there it is, sauntering or slinking out of the trees, to crouch down and drink and have a soak. And believe it or not, you’ll feel more privileged than if you were offered complimentary membership to the most exclusive billionaires’ club in the world.

Ranjit Lal is an author, environmentalist and birdwatcher