Marielle van Uitert (49) from Vught has been traveling the world for years to photograph wolves. But last year she spent in her camouflage suit and with her camera on the Veluwe to capture the predator. “I never thought I would come face to face with a wolf,” says Marielle. Her wolf photos are now featured in National Geographic Junior magazine.
Several times a month, 49-year-old Marielle leaves her home in Vught for the Veluwe in the middle of the night. There she puts on her ‘camouflage tree suit’ and then spends hours with her camera waiting for the wolf.
“It takes a lot of patience and luck. Of the more than thirty times that I was on the Veluwe, I only saw a wolf three times,” says Marielle.
During one of those times, the photographer came face to face with three wolves. One of those wolves stopped just twenty to thirty yards away in front of her. “That was really cool, because that’s what you do it for. But I also had a lot of adrenaline and tension in my body.”
“Of course I immediately went to take pictures, but the light was not good at the time. In the end I have very ugly and grainy photos,” says de Vughtse afterwards with a smile.
“The chance of seeing a wolf is very small.”
In recent years, Marielle has photographed the wolf several times in Ethiopia, Italy, Germany and Belgium. “When I started as a wolf photographer about five years ago, the first wolf had just been seen in the Netherlands. I loved that, but as a photographer I could never find that one wolf. That is why I traveled abroad a lot.”
The wolf is now officially back in the Netherlands. A year ago, the Vughtse went looking for traces and faeces of the animal on the Veluwe. To discover the habitat of the predator. “Such a wolf sometimes has a territory of 200 square kilometers, so the chance that you see one is very small. But now I know where to go,” says Marielle.
In very exceptional cases, the photographer was allowed to hang game cameras together with a forest ranger. And she was allowed to go into the nature reserve with her camera to capture the wolf. “You have to be very careful because you are in the habitat of a protected species.”
“Tonight I will get back in the car to the Veluwe.”
Marielle’s adventure in the Veluwe and dozens of her photos can be seen in a special wolf edition of the monthly magazine. “Now that you see all my photos in one magazine, it seems like a lot. But this is a collection of over 4.5 years that I have been doing this work. Then it is quite disappointing,” says the photographer.
“Tonight I will get back in the car to the Veluwe and then I hope that I encounter one again. So that chance is very small.”
The special edition of National Geographic Junior on the return of the wolf is in stores until July 12. On the website there are more photos and experiences about Marielle’s adventures.
