Entrants in this year’s contest were invited to submit images showcasing life on Earth, and illustrating some of the many threats that our planet faces. Images from this gallery were originally published in bioGraphic, an independent magazine about nature and conservation powered by the California Academy of Sciences, and media partner of the BigPicture Photography Competition. The organizers have once again shared some of the winners and finalists here. The captions were written by the bioGraphic editorial staff and edited for style.
Winners of the 2022 BigPicture Natural World Photography Competition
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The Stoat’s Game: Terrestrial Life Finalist. In the predawn hours of a cold winter morning in the French Alps, the photographer Jose Grandío lay still in the snow, waiting for a stoat (Mustela erminea) to emerge from its burrow. Shortly after the sun rose, the stoat climbed out and proceeded to put on a spectacular show. “He seemed to be playing with the fresh snow that had just fallen, making sudden jumps and crawling through the snow,” Grandío recalls. The stoat leaped and danced for about half an hour before returning to his den for the rest of the day. #
Jose Grandío / BigPicture Natural World Photography Competition -
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Frame Within a Frame: Winged Life Winner. As the COVID-19 pandemic restricted travel, the photographer Sitaram May started to pay more attention to the wildlife in his own backyard in India. “One night, sitting on my balcony, I was looking out at a custard apple tree, and bats were coming frequently to eat the fruits,” he recalls. “The whole world was cursing bats, but I decided to observe them.” May spent three weeks watching the fruit bats, eventually learning to predict their behavior and identify gaps in the tree canopy where they were likely to make an entrance. At one such opening, he managed to capture this shot, framing the bat within a ring of lush, green foliage. #
Sitaram May / BigPicture Natural World Photography Competition -
Tunnel Vision: Aquatic Life Finalist. Each year, from August to early October, Atlantic goliath groupers (Epinephelus itajara) gather off the east coast of Florida to spawn. On dark nights when the moon is new, refrigerator-size males produce low-frequency booming sounds by contracting their swim bladders, calling other groupers to congregate around shipwrecks or rocky reefs. The photographer and coral-reef ecologist Tom Shlesinger has witnessed this spectacle many times in recent years, but swimming with these 800-pound gentle giants never gets old. During one dive last September, he watched, captivated, as a large male swam calmly through a huge, swirling school of round scads (Decapterus punctatus). “It looked like he was swimming through a tunnel of fish,” Shlesinger recalls, “and I immediately knew this was the perfect moment to capture a unique perspective.” #
Tom Shlesinger / BigPicture Natural World Photography Competition -
Face to Face: Human/Nature Finalist. A jaguar (Panthera onca) and a domestic pig face off through a woven-wire fence, photographed by the Mexico-based photographer Fernando Constantino Martínez Belmar on Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula. #
Fernando Constantino Martínez Belmar / BigPicture Natural World Photography Competition -
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Bee Balling: Grand Prize Winner. On a warm spring morning in South Texas, a female cactus bee (Diadasia rinconis) emerged from her small, cylindrical nest in the ground. Almost instantly, she was swarmed by dozens of patrolling males, their bodies forming a buzzing, roiling “mating ball” as they vied for a chance to copulate with her. After a tumultuous 20 seconds or so, the ball of bees dissipated, and the female flew off—a single, victorious male holding tight to her back. Mating aggregations only last for a little more than a week, so the photographer Karine Aigner was fortunate to capture this particular mating ball. #
Karine Aigner / BigPicture Natural World Photography Competition -
Hidden Beauty: Landscapes, Waterscapes, and Flora Winner. Deep in a cenote on Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula, the photographer Tom St George encountered this otherworldly, seemingly lifeless cavern, its dimly lit waters penetrated by thousands of dramatic stalactites. Inhospitable though it may appear, this flooded cave is actually far from barren. It is part of an extensive subterranean network of flooded passages, sinkholes, and caves that host a surprising diversity of fish and zooplankton, most of which are found only in the Yucatán. #
Tom St George / BigPicture Natural World Photography Competition -
Into the Light: Art of Nature Winner. When the photographer Pål Hermansen walked outside one brisk March morning in Ski, Norway, and looked back at his house, he was dismayed. One of the outdoor lights had been left on all night, and within its bright shell, he saw the dark stains of dozens of insects, drawn to their death by the accidental beacon. As he cleaned out the fixture, Hermansen was inspired to photograph the collection of insects, hoping to shine a light on “the hidden creatures that are a foundation for our lives—creatures that we easily ignore.” #
Pål Hermansen / BigPicture Natural World Photography Competition -
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After the Fall: Aquatic Life Winner. California sea lions (Zalophus californianus) are iconic members of the Monterey Bay ecosystem, and the photographer David Slater loves diving with them. “They rush past you with such beauty and grace that they leave you stunned.” But during a dive last September, Slater witnessed a more somber sea lion scene. On a mucky stretch of sea floor, a dead sea lion had fallen to its final resting place, a colorful array of bat stars (Patiria miniata) strewn across its body like flowers tossed onto a grave. Bat stars are omnivorous and frequently feed on carcasses that fall to the ocean floor. #
David Slater / BigPicture Natural World Photography Competition -
Spider Web: Terrestrial Life Winner. It was dawn in Hungary’s Kiskunsag National Park, and the photographer Bence Máté lay still, barely breathing, on a coffin-size floating hide. In front of him, a Eurasian beaver (Castor fiber) was busy gnawing on a tree, backlit by the first rays of morning sun. Nearby, previously felled trees emerged like dock pilings from the mist-shrouded water, one of them festooned with a glowing spider web. #
Bence Máté / BigPicture Natural World Photography Competition
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