Kainuu predators sitting ducks for foreign nature photographers
Cameramen pay top dollar for opportunity to catch wolves and bears lured by animal carcasses
By Tuija Pallaste
On the swamp of Rahkosuo on the eastern edge of Kuhmo lies a pond with two small sheds. There are narrow slits on the walls, in addition to fist-sized holes.
Norwegian photographer Hans Gundersen has spent a week in one of the sheds. In the daytime he has caught a few winks of sleep. He spends the nights staring out the windows.
A couple of nights earlier the wait was well rewarded. Two wolves and a bear came into view at the same time. The wolves lunged at the bear, which swiped its paw at them. One of the wolves fled, and the other one was no longer to be seen. Perhaps he was knocked out by the blow of the paw, thought Gundersen later. He did not think about such details while the incident was going on, because his adrenalin was running, and he was busy with his camera.
Gundersen’s documentaries on large predators have been successful in Europe. He probably would not be in Kainuu if Finland were to give a stricter interpretation to EU regulations on the feeding of animals living in the wild.
Member states are allowed to permit the feeding of wild animals, whose meat is not intended for human consumption. In Finland, the bear does not fit this description.
Gundersen pays Lassi Rautiainen more than EUR 200 a day for making sure that there is a pig’s carcass in the area to attract bears, wolverines, and wolves within the range of his camera and the blind. The hungry film-stars arrive to feast on the carcasses, and the photographer need only point the camera out of the hole. This is a luxury for Gundersen; it doesn’t matter that there is no bed, and that the only toilet in the five square-metre shed is a bucket.
Gundersen is not the only professional to have come to the area, attracted by the prospect of seeing predators in their natural habitat.
The landscapes of the part of Finland with the highest predator population have featured in foreign wilderness, nature, and camping magazines, in movie backdrops, and even in the news media.
Ari Sääski of Kuhmo, who places animal carcasses in the area, calculates that during the current season, which extends from the early spring to the autumn, about ten percent of his approximately 500 customers have been foreign journalists or camera operators. Within the year, Britain’s BBC and ITV have been there, as well as German Television, Radio France, and Italy’s RAI.
They represent an audience of tens of millions of people on their own. "I don’t get to see the TV programmes, but I have asked them to send the magazines. I don’t really know what they say, as I cannot even pronounce the languages", Sääski says as he goes through the clippings that he has received.
Rendezvous mit Karhu, reads the cover of one German magazine above a picture of a bear ("karhu" is Finnish for bear).
Even more predator photographers visit the two carcass spots of Lassi Rautiainen in Suomussalmi and Kuhmo; Rautiainen is a photographer himself, and he travels around Europe to promote his blinds at exhibitions and fairs.
He lists the countries he has visited: Sweden, Norway, Germany, England, France, Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Poland, Hungary, Estonia, and Canada.
Ordinary tourists are a minority at Rautiainen’s blind, but now there are more of them as well. "The brown bear is our real trump card. Nowhere else in the world can you look at it like this", Sääski explains.
In addition to bringing notoriety to the region, the companies setting up blinds and using carcasses to lure predators bring in money. A night in a wildlife blind can cost up to EUR 300. Lassi Rautiainen calculated after the summer of 2004 that the four entrepreneurs in the business collected a total of EUR one million, including flights. More than 1,000 clients came to look at the predators feeding. Seven out of ten of the visitors were from abroad.
A new entrepreneur has appeared in Kainuu, and predator-watching is now offered by two entrepreneurs in North Karelia as well.
"There is room for growth with nearly all entrepreneurs. If we took care of things efficiently, we could easily increase business fivefold."
"A bear safari in Kainuu is now being offered by British and Dutch travel agencies that have not previously been interested in Finland."
Kuhmo Mayor Eila Valtanen believes that nature tourism could have a great potential, either in the form of predator watching, or hunting.
"The image of Finland that is projected abroad is certainly better here than at a rainy stadium!"
But there are also those in Kainuu who are not as favourable toward promoters of tourism that yearn for foreign attention.
Hunting is a source of honour and excitement in the area - much more so than a visit from the BBC. Hunting licences are held by 3,500 of Kuhmo’s 11,000 residents.
There is a dispute brewing between hunters and the entrepreneurs. Two years ago the companies were given permission to use carcasses to attract predators even during the hunting season, and protective zones covering hundreds of hectares were set up around the blinds.
The keepers of the blinds have been accused of effectively setting up sanctuaries where the predators can relax, while hunters can barely make their quotas.
Olavi Pääkkönen, the executive director of the region’s game management association, says that he knows that some hunters come from "down south", who use "unfair" means of hunting: they linger in areas just outside the restricted zones to get animals attracted by the food near the nature blinds.
Of the four bears shot this autumn, two were killed by outsiders. One of the two cases led to an investigation, as the kill might have occurred near a feeding place.
There are also concerns that the predators could grow too accustomed to humans. Rautiainen actually fell foul of the law when he tried to prove otherwise. In a video recorded by Rautiainen, a bear turns away, as a live reindeer raises its head at the carcass site. Using live animals as bait is illegal.
"Naturally we must consider if the animals are growing too accustomed to people. But at times I have felt that the discussion here has seemed to be silly bickering among the boys", Mayor Valtanen sighs.
"There are half a million hectares of forest in Kuhmo, and 2.1 million hectares in all of Kainuu. Certainly photographers, hunters, and predators will fit in that area. Every single euro and every cent is needed here."
The worldwide notoriety could fade for natural reasons as well. The Finnish Game and Fisheries Research Institute has followed the impact of carcass feeding areas on the movements of bears. The routes of animals fitted with satellite tracking collars show that none of the animals have settled in an area where easy meals are available. However, their existence has changed their behaviour.
Some of the predators have lost at least some of their wildness.
Female bears have brought cubs to the feeding spots. Mother bears usually hide their young carefully, because male bears sometimes kill them.
Predators grown accustomed to easy meals and the ursine equivalent of a free lunch are also becoming less photogenic, growing big, droopy bellies.
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 18.9.2005
TUIJA PALLASTE / Helsingin Sanomat
tuija.pallaste@hs.fi
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| 20.9.2005 - THIS WEEK |
 Kainuu predators sitting ducks for foreign nature photographers |
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