Chimp cuddles and clever coyotes: the 10th BigPicture Natural World photography competition – in pictures

A decade on from its beginnings, the BigPicture Natural World photography competition attracts thousands of entries from around the world. Its aim is to highlight the extraordinary and often fleeting moments of wonder and beauty in nature while bringing attention to ecosystems in need of protection and conservation. Open to professionals and amateurs, contestants enter for the chance to win cash as well as the opportunity to be exhibited at the California Academy of Sciences

Main image: Nose to Nose; Human/Nature winner: Doug Gimesy was documenting work at the Joey and Bat Sanctuary near Melbourne when he met a wombat (Vombatus ursinus) whose mother had been killed by a car. Gimesy watched as a young veterinary student bottle-fed the orphaned joey, then touched her nose to the joey’s in a tender moment of interspecies bonding. Photograph: Doug Gimesy/BigPicture

  • Coyote Crossing; grand prize winner

    Chicago coyotes typically live only about three years, compared to 10 years on average elsewhere in the wild and up to 18 years in captivity. Their most common cause of death is being struck by a car. But coyotes have found ingenious ways to coexist with humans. In the Windy City, where Corey Arnold tagged along with scientists from the Cook County Urban Coyote Research Project, coyotes regularly use train trestles like this one to circumvent busy highways.
    Photo shows a Chicago highway at night time, illuminated by yellow and white streetlights, with a train trestle constructed over the road. A single coyote can be seen right in the middle of the shot using the train trestle to cross the road.

  • Life on the Edge; Terrestrial Wildlife finalist

    Nubian ibexes (Capra nubiana) live on the knife edge of survival, in deserts with scant vegetation and harsh climates. They also live at the literal edge of cliffs.Males of the species grow backward-curving horns that can be more than a metre (up to four feet) long. They use these impressive weapons to defend against predators and to compete with others for breeding rights, as photographer Amit Eshel captured in this image of two clashing males in Israel’s Zin Desert.
    Two Nubian ibexes, a species of wild goat, clashing at the edge of a rocky cliff; the one closer to the cliff edge is on all four legs while the other, which is closer to the camera, is reared up on its hind legs. Both have extremely long and curved horns. In the background, dusty brown cliffs can be seen extending into the distance, with striations visible in the sedimentary rock.

  • Magical Mushroom; Art of Nature winner

    Is it waves crashing on to shore? A landscape of furrowed canyons? The topography of a distant planet? In fact, it’s the gills of a fungus from the genus Lactarius, better known as milk cap mushrooms for the milky, latex-like liquid they ooze when cut. J Fritz Rumpf was foraging for mushrooms in Arizona’s White Mountains when he picked up this one and noticed the colours of its gills. Many species of milk cap ‘bruise’ when chemicals in their fruiting bodies are exposed to air, turning them a murky blue-green.
    Gills of a fungus from the genus Lactarius, better known as milk cap mushrooms for the milky, latex-like liquid they ooze when cut. The mushroom's gills are bruised blue-green, and ruffled and wavy instead of straight as they usually appear when fresh. Many species of milk cap 'bruise' when chemicals in their fruiting bodies are exposed to air, turning them a murky blue-green.

  • Spotted; Terrestrial Wildlife winner

    At first glance, this might seem like a mother snow leopard (Panthera uncia) playing with her kitten, but a closer look reveals a lack of distinct spots on the cloudy fur of the smaller cat. The smaller, fully grown feline is actually a Pallas’s cat (Otocolobus manul), a small wildcat whose range across Central Asia overlaps with its better-known cousin.When Donglin Zhou saw a snow leopard stealthily approaching a mother Pallas’ cat on the Qinghai-Tibet plateau, she was astonished. ‘Both species are hard to see at any time,’ she said, ‘let alone together.’
    Spotted; Terrestrial Wildlife winner At first glance, this might seem like a mother snow leopard (Panthera uncia) playing with her kitten, but a closer look reveals a lack of distinct spots on the cloudy fur of the smaller cat. The smaller, fully grown feline is actually a Pallas’s cat, or manul (Otocolobus manul), a small wildcat whose range across Central Asia overlaps with its better-known cousin. When Donglin Zhou saw a snow leopard stealthily approaching a mother Pallas’ cat on the Qinghai-Tibet plateau, she was astonished. ‘Both species are hard to see at any time,’ she said, ‘let alone together.’

  • Stunning Cephalopod; Aquatic Life finalist

    The iridescent symmetry of this blanket octopus plays a key role in the cephalopod’s success as a predator. Most blanket octopuses observed are females, like this one photographed in the Philippines. Females can grow up to two metres long and up to 40,000 times heavier than the walnut-sized males, and sport a characteristic fleshy ‘blanket’ draped over their tentacles, which makes them appear even larger.
    An iridescent female blanket octopus photographed in the Philippines; its main is pink and white and translucent, while its 'blanket' stretching between its tentacles glows a green-blue colour. Outstretched in front are two more of its tentacles, with their suckers visible along their lengths.

  • All My Children; Human/Nature finalist

    At the Lwiro Primate Sanctuary in Kahuzi-Biega National Park in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Photographer Marcus Westberg, who spent weeks at the sanctuary, said that caregivers treat the chimpanzees as tenderly if they’re human children, and the young chimps, likewise, often act like kids. Wild chimps typically stay close to their mothers until they’re about 5 years old, so when a mother is killed by poachers, the separation can cause irreparable harm for young, developing chimps.
    A woman crouches while filling a hot water bottle with water; she is carrying a young chimpanzee on her front as if it were a human child, while another, smaller and younger chimp is wrapped in a bright red cloth and strapped to her back, around her waist.

  • Catch Me If You Can; Winged Life winner

    This egret (Egretta garzetta) in a lake near Xiamen, China was caught off-guard when the small fish it had been eyeing was chased clear out of the water – by a much larger fish. Photographer Xiaoping Lin used high-speed continuous shooting to capture the startled egret as it lifted off above the churning waves. The resulting image of fleeting action permanently frozen in a palette of whites and silvers is ‘like a poem’, Lin said.
    An egret with all white feathers jumps up from foamy waters in this photo, its black legs extended almost completely straight out underneath it. To its left, a small fish it had been eyeing is airborne above the water's white surface, followed by a much larger fish that obviously also has its eyes on the prize.

  • Regeneration; Landscape, Waterscapes, and Flora winner

    Many forests in Jasper National Park in Alberta, Canada, benefit from naturally occurring, low-intensity wildfires. Without fire, trees grow unnaturally dense, and dead logs accumulate on the forest floor. This timber can collide with hotter, drier conditions and cause explosively large wildfires. Now forest managers are trying to reverse a century of misguided management by igniting controlled burns. The landscape may look different, but as this haunting image of a burned spruce forest shows, they can be equally captivating.
    A shot of burned spruce forest, showing blackened and bare tree trunks; far in the distance, a rainbow of deciduous forest can be seen, with some deep green vegetation further up and patches of red, orange and purple further down. These forests can be seen against a backdrop of a snow-covered mountain face.

  • Blades and Spines; Aquatic Life winner

    Kate Vylet was swimming back to shore one day after diving in a thriving kelp forest off the coast of Carmel Bay, California, when she saw a blade of loose kelp being devoured by purple and red sea urchins (Strongylocentrotus purpuratus and Mesocentrotus franciscanus). To her, it illustrated the role urchins can still play in a balanced ecosystem, and she set up her camera to capture nature at work in all its complex ebbs and flows.
    An underwater shot of a sea floor covered in purple sea urchins, with one red sea urchin visible near the middle of the shot. A large blade of kelp is disappearing into the sea urchins, being devoured slowly by them. Above, the blue ocean water can be seen with sunlight streaming through the thick kelp forest.
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