July is the holiday season in Finland. Like many others, I have taken a little time away from my daily routine. Slowing down has given me space to think about why I still do what I do after all these years.

For many people, wildlife photography is a hobby. For me, it has always been much more than that. It is both my greatest passion and my profession. One question I hear surprisingly often is how I manage to keep my enthusiasm when my work and my free time are built around the same thing.

The answer has never been photography itself.

It has always been nature.

Photography has simply become the way I experience it, understand it, and hopefully help others understand it as well.

A photograph can create a connection

I believe that people protect what they feel connected to.

Facts and statistics are important, but they rarely create the emotional connection that inspires people to care. A single encounter with a wild animal, a quiet morning in the forest, or a photograph that makes someone stop for a moment can sometimes achieve something that numbers cannot.

One thing I have noticed over the years is that photography often sparks curiosity. Someone photographs a bird for the first time and wants to know its name. They begin to wonder where it lives, why it behaves the way it does, or where it migrates. A single photograph can become the first step towards understanding a species and its place in nature.

That curiosity matters. A deeper understanding often leads to a deeper appreciation, and appreciation is where conservation begins.

That belief has guided much of my work over the years.

If photography can help even a few more people appreciate wildlife and understand the places these animals call home, then perhaps it also helps create a desire to protect them.

Conservation is not only about governments, organisations, or large companies. It also begins with our own relationship with nature and with the choices we make every day.

We all have a responsibility

I have always felt a close connection with nature. Looking back, I realise I took that connection for granted for many years. Growing up and spending so much of my life outdoors, it simply felt natural.

Only later did I begin to understand that not everyone has that same relationship with nature. For many people, wildlife is something they see on television or in photographs rather than something they experience for themselves.

That realisation has changed the way I think about photography and guiding. If we want people to care about nature, we first need to help them experience it. Connection comes before conservation.

We often talk about what governments, large companies, or organisations should do to protect the environment. Those conversations are important, but they can also make it easy to overlook something much closer to home.

What is my own relationship with nature?

And what am I doing to look after it?

Can I talk about conservation if people fly to Finland?

From time to time, I receive criticism because my work brings international visitors to Finland. It is a fair question.

Flying has an environmental impact. There is no point pretending otherwise.

But aviation is only one part of a much larger picture.

If even a small number of our guests return home with a deeper appreciation for wildlife and begin making better choices in their own lives, I believe that has value too. Not because it cancels out emissions—it does not—but because lasting change often begins with understanding.

The experience also rarely ends when the journey does. People share their photographs with family, friends, and colleagues. They tell stories about the wildlife they encountered and the places they visited. I hope those conversations encourage someone else to become curious about nature or to see wildlife in a different way.

We can never measure that effect, but I hope it reaches further than the people who joined us in the field. A single experience can spread far beyond the person who was there.

Nature has changed many people’s lives.

Perhaps it can also change the way they think about protecting it.

We are visitors in someone else’s home

One thing that worries me is how easily nature can become another product to consume.

Social media has made spectacular wildlife photographs seem almost ordinary. It is easy to believe that every destination offers guaranteed sightings, perfect light, and memorable images within a few hours.

Sometimes it feels as if people arrive expecting nature to perform for them.

But nature is not an amusement park.

Whenever we walk into a forest, along a shoreline, or into the mountains, we are entering someone else’s home. Not only the home of the wildlife we hope to photograph, but often the home of the local people who live there.

I have picked up litter left behind after a photography session and explained to slightly embarrassed adults that if they were able to carry their lunch into the field, they can certainly carry the packaging back out again.

I have encouraged people to refill their water bottles with Finland’s excellent tap water instead of buying another plastic bottle.

More times than I can count, I have gently stopped someone from moving a little closer to a bird or a wild animal simply because they wanted a tighter composition or better angle.

None of these conversations are really about photography.

They are about respect.

Giving something back

People often ask what wildlife photographers can do for conservation.

There is no single answer.

Our company spends time building nest boxes and nesting platforms for owls. It has become a project involving many people, and I will write more about it later this autumn.

Around our own home, part of the garden has been left to grow naturally for nearly a decade, creating habitat for butterflies and other insects.

At our summer cottage, we remove large numbers of bream from an overgrown lake to help improve water quality. Rather than letting the fish go to waste, we turn it into minced fish and use it in our cooking during winter. We also harvest excessive aquatic vegetation to help restore the balance of the lake.

For many years, I have also bought almost all of my own clothes from second-hand shops. I have never understood why buying used items is sometimes still seen as something negative. Reusing what already exists should be something we are proud of.

These are simply the choices that fit our lives.

Not everyone has a garden to rewild. Not everyone has a summer cottage where they can help restore a lake or build nest boxes for wildlife. I know I am fortunate to have those opportunities.

I believe there is something every one of us can do. Perhaps that means picking up litter during a walk. Perhaps it means supporting local conservation work. Perhaps it means buying less, repairing instead of replacing, or choosing locally produced food whenever possible. In many ways, our grandparents lived like this not because it was fashionable, but because it was simply how life worked.

Or perhaps it simply means spending enough time in nature that you begin to care about what happens to it.

As wildlife photographers, I think we owe nature something.

After all, it has already given us far more than photographs.

What is your way of giving a little back?

Read more

• What Happens When Bird Locations Spread Too Easily?

(I’ll be taking a short summer break, so there probably won’t be a new blog post next week. I’ll be back after the holiday.)