2023-11-17 20:09:00
“It’s a meeting that we can’t decide, it’s really a surprise. What is quite extraordinary is that this meeting was completely by chance, it almost did not happen”.
Michel Lacroix, a veterinarian from Genval who is also passionate regarding animal photography, still can’t believe it: however, the encounter he talks regarding is not from yesterday… but when you come face to face with a wolf, you don’t can’t believe his eyes!
“At the start, I check an observation site where I will see if there are any interesting animals to see in the country. I’m absolutely not going for such an animal… I see 2 birds of prey that I like (Editor’s note: including one in Limburg that he had already photographed at the time),” he remembers. “I’m not dressed in camouflage at all that day: I’m in shorts, completely visible, like a human being. I walk on the path. All of a sudden, I see, regarding twenty meters in front of me, a gray back walking around. ‘Ah, I’m going to take a photo of a deer.’ And then he raises his head: I see pointed red ears… ‘ah, a fox’. And there, there comes out some grass.”
And Michel Lacroix gets to the heart of his wonderful story: “All of a sudden, I see the appearance, I see the animal, no more doubt, it’s a wolf! And this wolf is walking along the path, 20 meters in front of me.”
“This is the chance of my life”
“I move slowly towards him. And then, little by little, he begins to cross the road once more, he returns to the path, he crosses this track. He turns around, he looks at me. Me, I am frozen, not at all camouflaged, right in the middle of the path and visible as anything, behind my camera. I trigger, I trigger, I trigger. I take photos saying to myself ‘this is the chance of my life, it’s really an extraordinary stroke of luck’.”
The friendly vet, whose office is located on rue de Rosières – at the top of the station near the “Peyo roundregarding” – has the art of recounting this improbable meeting, which took place in the heart of the summer, in Limburg.
We don’t miss a bit of his story. He continues: the young wolf, not very fearful at the moment (read below), “crosses the path, goes down the aisle. I say to myself ‘this is fantastic’. I think I’m calling my partner. At that moment, I see the foliage moving and there it comes out.”
“A state of incredible joy”
“We did a pretty fantastic photo shoot, it lasted regarding twenty minutes where this wolf came out and looked at me each time. He was staring at me,” testifies the man who was already fascinated by the wolf before this unforgettable tête-à-tête. “I was taking photos, photos, photos, I was machine-gunning. He went into the bushes and then came out on the path. This little game continued like that, because I was moving towards him slowly… he was moving away little by little while eating berries from the trees.”
“And then, at one point, because the magic stops: I no longer saw her, she came out 5 meters away, the safety distance was too short, she dove back into the shoulder, she disappeared into the corn… I felt that I had really had my reward, and I left for the car in a state of incredible joy. This is the meeting.” Fascinating.
Photo: Michel Lacroix ©Michel LacroixPhoto: Michel Lacroix ©Michel LacroixPhoto: Michel Lacroix ©Michel Lacroix
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