IF CARLSBERG BREWED BEAUTY

There are so many horrors in the world right now that I badly need some mental medication and one way of recovering is to remember some of the inspiring natural beauty I've enjoyed around the world.

Having been privileged to visit some remarkable places during my sixty years making wildlife films, and even though concentrating behind a film camera, my basic happy-snapper clicks away when time allows.

Choosing the first place to visit in my 'Carlsberg Beauty' idea is easy because the Andes Mountains in Patagonia are so stunning, especially in the Torres del Paine National Park. I was lucky to camp here in the wilds with my assistant and good friend Donaldo Maciver on and off for more than two years. Donny was a gaucho from Argentina, well versed in the challenges of surviving in the wilds and a great companion, though now most sadly departed. 

 

Our task was to try to make a first ever film on pumas for National Geographic television. Pumas are also called mountain lions or cougars in North America and the adventure with these big cats was as memorable as life gets, for even finding them was a relentless though rewarding challenge. 

 

Ruthlessly persecuted by the gauchos, these pumas were terrified of humans and during the first few weeks, they simply fled on even sensing our presence and despite being protected by law, the local gauchos infiltrated the National Park while we were filming and shot at least three pumas. So it took me four months to try to befriend and eventually win the trust of just one cat, this beautiful lady we called Penny.  After several more months of tense relationship building, she allowed me the privilege of following her around the mountains while she looked for prey.

I was writing a book about her adventures and as I’m not a good enough stills photographer, I asked my good friend and ace photographer, Laurie Campbell to join me in Chile and take some proper pictures of her. So these beautiful pics of Penny are Laurie’s work and though several of the pics of the park and scenery are mine, the good ones are Laurie's! We had a great few weeks out there together, trying to find the cats and do justice to this stunning place, so I should crack on and finish writing that book.

Mountain lions are notorious in the Americas for killing one or two people each year, so I hoped that when she looked at me like this, she wasn’t thinking ‘dinner’!

In fact, soon after I had finished my film in Torres del Paine National Park, a fisherman was killed down by the lake where I had been filming and if it had happened while I was there, I certainly wouldn’t have been following her around in the middle of the night!

On one occasion, I was filming her eating a kill when the moon became hidden behind thick clouds, and as there was no light for my special lens, I curled up in the heather to catch some sleep. But curiosity got the better of her and she crept up to sniff my head. She gave me a hell of a fright and I certainly didn’t risk that nightmare again, so sat on a stool instead!

The bond of trust we had between us was remarkable, for she was relaxed enough to allow me to follow her as she hunted and when resting in the sun, I was allowed to sit quietly by my camera just a few yards away. She would even curl up to sleep .

Even though pumas are the star attraction in the park, there are many more critters, some of which are on the big cats menu, the most notable being the guanaco, the direct ancestors of lamas and surprisingly perhaps, also related to the African camels before the continents separated.

They are formidable animals, tall and muscular and weigh twice that of pumas, so hanging onto them when and if they catch hold of one is a dangerous mission and can lead to injury. 

Success is hard earned and one in maybe eight attempts a winner but once achieved, they provide a meal for several days, or a lot less when Penny had two cubs to feed.

Worse still, she had competition from the numerous Andean Condors, so had to be careful to cover the carcass before dawn to hide it from preying eyes. I was lucky to film her scraping paw fulls of vegetation for twenty minutes or so while the cubs played rugby scrum wrestling until she had covered the carcass. They then took an interest in my huddled form and it was slightly alarming sitting there in the dark surrounded by three large cats looking intently at a slightly nervous me! They would leave as dawn approached and if she hadn't done a good enough job, the condors would devour several days of cat food in a few hours.

The ostrich like rhea is also on her menu, foxes too if they aren't quick enough when scavenging her kills, and foxes never missing an opportunity for a meal, they learnt to hang around camp for scraps. Taming them was easy, dog biscuits being very welcome, though little bits of cheese were so desirable that I had them eating off my knee.

They dug an earth close to our camp, their 'supermarket', so Laurie was able to set up a hide and photograph the charming little cubs.

All this was unfolding among this stunning scenery, come rain, snow or shine … or storms. These 'lenticular' clouds are whipped up by the cold from the largest glacier in South America, hidden just behind the mountains. They create wind ... and I mean WIND, so fierce that it has blown roofs off hotels, rolled Land Rovers and lifted water off lakes into the mountains. There is a famous saying ‘that if you want to see Patagonia, you just stand still and it will all blow past you’!

Missing Sue and our two children at home, I would always go home for important occasions, especially Christmas, so I was away from Penny for a few weeks. Then upon returning, and despite not seeing me for a while, she walked up and greeted me with a meow. It was unforgettable because that trust, even affection between human and wild animal is as good as life gets, especially if you’re a wildlife film-maker. 

      Even now, remembering that moment brings tears to my eyes.

And there’s a happy ending to this adventure, for our film was so admired by the local hotels and lodges in the National Park that on rainy days, they would show it to their guests. And when visiting six years later for a holiday with my soul mate Robin Pratt to celebrate my sixtieth birthday, I was recognised by the staff and my brief moment of fame resulted in gifts of food and wine. 

What kind folk the Chileans are, especially those in our  hosteria on this beautiful lakeside island, with views to die for.

I had known Robin since my teenage years at school, for he and his two sisters lived up in the remote hills of central Wales and their love of wildlife was an inspiration, so I spent memorable holidays with the family, walking the hills looking for red kites. 

They were very rare then, down to just a few pairs, so their recovery is a remarkable good news story.

Robin became RSPB warden on Ramsey Island and when not mending stone walls, we'd dive among the seals for lobsters and count choughs. Robin met and married Judy and they raised three daughters on Ramsey, farming red deer on the island until school dictated a move to the mainland, and in case you're wondering where this story is going, he started breeding guanacos in Wales and it became the largest such farm in Europe. His visit to Chile with me to study the Park's guanacos helped him to understand their complex behaviour and his herd grew to about two hundred and fifty, providing some of the finest wool scarves in the world. Guanaco fleece is wonderfully warm - and they need it!

And there's another happy ending to our filming because I'm told by our friends in Chile that, because of the film, it didn’t take long for the estancia owners to realise that tourists were worth more dollars than sheep, so stopped killing the pumas and provided 'home stays' on their estancias so their tourists could enjoy watching wildlife, with pumas the star attraction. Since then, all the wildlife has flourished, there’s many more pumas now and they’ve become so tame that large film crews can stand among the big cats and are ignored, even with drones flying over the cats heads.

The resulting films of these beautiful big cats and their hunting and family life are truly remarkable, not least the recent Attenborough series on the BBC called ‘Dynasties’. So it’s a win, win result, our pioneering film not only saving pumas but proving that wildlife on television can indeed have a positive effect on our natural world and its' wildlife. 

So some good news instead of bad. Excellent!

And if you still need some more beautiful photography for happiness medication and would like to admire more of Laurie Campbell's lovely images, you can visit his website. 

There's hundreds of stunners ... and he's illustrated and written many lovely books such as ' Otters - Return to the river', 'Highlands - Scotland's Wild Heart' and 'Golden Eagles', even contributing to one of mine, 'The Great Wood of Caledon'.

I have other friends who are 'Carlsberg' photographers, so I'll  add some more of my stories from the wilds and from some great cities too when time allows. So watch this space and enjoy the spring beauty out in the fresh air.

WILDLIFE FILM-MAKING - an introduction

two of the stars in our leopard film for the BBC - "A Darknesss in the Grass" - 1985-6

CHAPTER 1

For most of my life I’ve enjoyed the privilege of travelling to some of the remotest corners of the world to film wildlife.

a polar bear hunting the pack ice at midnight for our BBC series of three films "Kingdom of the Ice Bear" - 1983-85

Wildlife has been a passion of mine since childhood and after leaving film college in 1965 I started a career making films with the BBC Film Unit. I left in 1973 and since then have been lucky enough to spend nearly fifty years out in the wilds with some wonderful animals and people.

the Andes Mountains in Patagonia can be a violent place, the wind lifting water off the surface of lakes

happiness is being high up in remote places

However, if you look up Hugh Miles on the internet you’d think, judging by the pictures that all I ever do is go fishing … if only … but it’s simply one of many hobbies I enjoy, gardening our two wooded acres being the most time consuming, especially as a stream flows though our patch and we’ve created five ponds.

'home sweet home' ... and always a joy to return to my family after weeks in the bush

So if this blog is going to be representative of my life it might be a good idea to start telling a few more stories about the animals I’ve been lucky enough to live with. But before I do, I’ll add a few words about my blog.

Since I started writing it has so far conjured up over 206,000 views from all over the world and I find it unbelievable that it has attracted so much interest. I know this number is only small beer compared with many blogs but 200,000 seems like a lot of readers. I’ve written five books but maybe this beats them for readership.

Unexpectedly, only 50% of readers come from the UK, for the USA contributes 25,000+ and most surprisingly, Russian viewers sometimes outnumber those in the UK. Other unusual countries include China, Brazil and South Korea though what they see in it I can’t imagine.

However, if my ramblings about wildlife, gardening and fishing are enjoyed by so many, I’m delighted because I simply love telling stories ... and some of them are true! For better or worse it’s in my blood and friends and family keep on insisting I should share my adventures. So if you keep on reading, I’ll keep on writing.

barnacle geese nesting in the remote north east of Greenland, filmed for the BBC's 'Ice Bear' in 1984

My job as a cameraman/producer required me to ‘live on the edge’ and I’ve always admired that famous ‘gardener’ who restored the glories of Heligan, Tim Smit because he believes that “if you’re not living on the edge you’re taking up too much space".

Ladakh in the Himalayas - filming for ITV's "Searching for the Snow Leopard" and usually only seeing footprints - 2001-04

camera 'traps' enabled us to identify individual cats. This was our territorial male called Mikmar at 15,000 feet

I’ve been trying to live on the edge since the 1970’s, so writing ‘tales from the bush’ seems like a natural extension to my past life creating stories for television. Writing a blog combines words and pictures, is a lot quicker, cheaper and easier than making films and in spite of the limitations, it seems like a reasonable alternative … but where to start?

glacier ice is always wonderful, whatever the continent ... and it sure is exciting when large lumps break off

It could be the Arctic or Antarctic, Svalbard or South America, Alaska or the Himalayas, New Guinea, even the UK … but I’d hate you to think I’m attempting to win ‘bragging rights’. I’m no publicist and quite shy but I’ve been extraordinarily lucky and consider every film I made a privilege because being able to live with charismatic animals and many marvellous folk is indeed a treat.

the Himalayas become ever more inspiring the higher you climb - filming for the BBC/David A's "Planet Earth" - 1982

the Impayan Pheasant is Nepal's national bird, also called appropriately 'the bird of many colours'

I have more than my fair share of special memories and even if I’d prefer to use my remaining time on this planet living in the present and future, recalling past adventures is enjoyable too.

the star when filming our BBC leopard film called "A Darkness in the Grass" - 1985-6

I thought I might start with a few stories about filming leopards in East Africa but on reading through my journals I’m finding that we had so many exciting moments it’s creating too many words. So by way of an introduction, I'll start with a few pictures from some of my more 'significant' films and carry on writing about leopards another day. 

As any photographer will have already noticed, I'm not a 'proper' stills photographer because if something good is happening I need to have the film camera in my hands to capture the action. Compromising the quality of the movie isn't an option so I've never taken many stills. Those I do are strictly happy snaps but don't get me wrong, I love taking pics but don't have the fancy cameras with auto focus etc. In fact, most of the pics are taken before the digital age on slide film using cameras that should be in a museum.

Anyway, the first major wildlife film I made was when I was head of the RSPB Film Unit. I'd 'done' blue tits and other cute birds more than enough so for one of the most exciting birds in the world I needed to look no further than the osprey. 

mum with two cubs almost ready to fly - one of several intimate moments filmed from the top of towering scaffolds

Such is the birds charisma that if I could nail some spectacular fishing dives and intimate scenes at the nest I stood a chance of being noticed by the BBC Natural History Unit and after two challenging but ultimately successful years my reputation rose like the ospreys splash and on completion, I joined the ranks of the self-unemployed. I hoped I didn't prove to be unemployable.

As a postscript, the film eventually sold to over forty countries so it turned out to be a nice little earner for the RSPB. As a staunch supporter since childhood, I was well pleased.

strike action! ospreys are such exciting birds and filming them for my RSPB movie was memorable - 1977-78

a suitably friendly greeting on the first of many visits to Africa

What followed was remarkable, for within days of finishing filming ospreys in Scotland I was on the plane to East Africa to film lions hunting in the wonderful Ngorongoro Crater. It was for one of the BBC's most famous series ever, "Life on Earth" and was their final shoot, for they had failed to capture the sequence twice already. No pressure then.

dinner time for the pride but for the wildebeest within a few hours, it's dust to dust

In spite of eight years at the BBC Film Unit in London filming all manner of progs like Beethoven and Dr.Who, along with five for the RSPB, I was still a comparative novice in the wildlife filming business so it took a deal of courage on the part of producer John Sparks to trust me with such an important shoot. My contract was for a month but within two weeks I was back home, a mixed blessing as I'd just spent over £20,000 on camera equipment and only received two weeks pay instead of four. However, my reputation was enhanced, for we'd filmed the lions making a double kill on the first day, another kill to match it on the second, then captured the rare sequence of two male cheetahs catching and killing a wildebeast. It was a remarkable run of good fortune and it's been downhill ever since!

a big fat mum with her little fat cubs - and filming for the BBC's legendary series "Life on Earth" was complete - 1978

 

As a result of the outstanding success of 'Life on Earth', these were exciting times, for in the early 80's we were entering the era of what became known as 'Blue Chip' movies ... the best that money could buy, with bigger budgets and huge audiences. I'm told by a friend that was at last weeks Wildscreen Festival that the pressure on budgets is such that they have now been renamed 'Blue Cheap'!

eight feet of towering bird above me -1978-79

I was hoping the Beeb would eventually trust me to shoot a complete film and surprisingly, within three days of finishing 'Life on Earth' I was back in East Africa to make a film about Ostriches for David A's BBC series "Wildlife on One". As a general rule, ostriches only attract 'walk on parts' in movies so anything interesting I filmed would likely be a 'first'. They would be a considerable challenge and I was acutely aware that if I didn't get any film I wouldn't get to eat. At least they couldn't fly away like ospreys but they could certainly walk and for the first four days they did just that ... away from me.

 
In the end I found a way of getting them to trust me and the result was a fascinating film that won me the Panda Award for best photography at the first ever 'Wildscreen', the world's leading wildlife film festival held every other year in Bristol. There was an amusing twist to this result because the prize was either the processing and printing of enough film for a half hour movie - very valuable - or an inflatable dinghy - more exciting. My son Peter was gutted when I returned home without the boat!

our male standing guard over his eggs and hatching chicks

You can just see my camera at the bottom of the nest but lying there with a wide angle lens carried a risk, for ostriches have a reputation for disembowling intruders, even lions. At first he would thump the ground forcefully and flap his wings in anger but I held my nerve and luckily he eventually trusted me enough to allow me to film intimate scenes without getting a good kicking.

our lady with her creche of chicks

My wildlife career was developing nicely but it takes a deal of courage on the part of producers to trust me to deliver the goods.  Several commissions came my way which I'll skip for now because for a few years otters became the focus of my life. 

at home on the wild and windy shores of Shetland

In the early eighties the Shetland Isles were one of the few places that otters could be reliably seen and it's difficult to believe that they were pretty much 'extinct' in most English counties. This 'rare' animal had never properly been filmed because they were regularly persecuted ... until the seventies hunters in Shetland received a bounty, so I had a big challenge ahead ... nothing like being thrown in at the deep end to film 'impossible' animals.

what a privilege it was to film these beautiful animals in Shetland's wind and rain ... though the sun did shine too - 1980-85

I only had one sighting in the first ten days but eventually won some success by habituating a particular female that after several weeks trusted me enough to be close to her and her cubs. 

seriously cute or maybe not? - three plus months of 'playful' but eventual killers

She would even swim up to me, so it was a magical experience and over about four years I made three films about her, the first of which was an Attenborough BBC "Widlife on One". As otters had hardly ever been seen on TV it was an extremely popular programme and garnered an impressive audience of 17.3 million.

they were always fond of lumpsuckers, a big meal and easy to catch

I took loads of pics of her and the cubs because I decided to write a book about living with these wonderful animals in the farthest corner of the British Isles. 

Now they are everywhere in the country and it's ironic that instead of the long journey to the Shetland Isles I can now film them in our garden in Dorset, eating our fish! Their recovery is one of conservations' greatest success stories, though I doubt many ducks and fish think it's cause for celebration.

These early successes with my filming meant that the world was opening up for me and next up I was lucky enough to be picked to film another extremely popular three part series for the Beeb,"Flight of the Condor". It was the pan pipes that done it!

the Andes Mountians in southern Chile - one of the most stunning locations to film in the world - 1980-82

Torres del Paine National Park is home to many condors and was our filming base for a few weeks  © Laurie Campbell

The three films told the story of an exciting journey from the very tip of South America at Cape Horn following the Andes Mountains all the way through Peru into the Amazon Basin in far off Equador.


One of the most exciting moments when filming in the Torres del Paine National Park in Chile was the brief sighting of a puma. This lit a fire so inspiring that I made a vow to return one day to try to make a film about these elusive cats.  

my star cat 'Penny' the puma that I lived with on and off for more than two years -1993-5 ... © Laurie Campbell

However, I didn't make it back until 1993 and I've still only reached 1980 in this introduction, so that and many other films I made in the next decade will have to wait until another day because it's very autumnal and I need to be in our lovely garden right now. I'll pen another introduction to more stories in due course, so in the meantime, if you're interested, watch this space.