Wildlife Photographer of the Year : [Very Interesting Stuff]

Submitted by Jerry on Sun, 11/30/2008 - 09:47.

The annual
Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Competition finds the very best
wildlife images taken by the world's top professional and amateur
photographers.

Ten long
months spent stalking the rare and elusive snow leopard in
temperatures as low as -40ºC paid off for a dogged photographer.

An image
of the Himalayan big cat, silhouetted against a black sky
filled with snow, won the aptly-named Steve Winter the Wildlife
Photographer of the Year award.

The
picture captures the majestic beauty of the endangered leopard
and the bitingly cold and hostile high-altitude landscape it manages to
survive in.

An
estimated 3,500-7,000 snow leopards (Uncia uncia) survive in the
high-altitude regions of the Himalayas and mountains of Central Asia. A
fearsome predator, it has suffered a steep decline in numbers because
of poaching for its highly-prized skin and body parts.

An
exhibition of the winning images will be on view at the Natural History
Museum
from October
31 2008 - April 26 2009.

Last year
the exhibition attracted almost 134,000 visitors and was
later seen by more than 1m people at regional and international venues.

Clash of eagles – Antoni Kasprzak, Poland. Winner, behaviour – birds