The photographers of the year 2025.
Category: Awarded a prize at London’s Natural History Museum.
Photographer: Win ven den heever
Title: Wildlife photographer
Location: Kolmanskop
The grand prize of Wildlife Photographer of the Year has been awarded to Wim van den Heever for a breathtaking shot of a brown hyena posed next to the crumbling walls of a forgotten diamond mine.
Van den Heever’s triumph was a decade in the making. After spotting fresh tracks in the deserted Namibian ghost town of Kolmanskop, he knew the rare creature was near. But catching it on film seemed impossible. The brown hyena is the most elusive of its kind, preferring to roam alone under the cover of night. “I knew they were there, but actually photographing one was just never going to happen,” he recalled thinking.
Category: Junior Grand Prize
Photographer: Andrea Dominizi, Italy
Title: After The Destruction
Location: Lapini Mountains, Lazio, Italy
“Dominizi captures a stark, recurring tragedy for countless species: habitat destruction. Here, a small beetle’s entire future is jeopardized—
it’s been stripped of the vital timber it requires to cradle its eggs and ensure the next generation.”
Category: Animals in their Environment.
Photographer: Shane Gross, Canada
Title: Like an Eel out of Water
Location: D’Arros Island, Amirante, Seychelle.
Last year’s winner, Shane Gross captured a died Peppered Moray Eel at Low Tide. He spent hours enduring the sun, heat, and flies, waiting where dead fish had washed up. Eventually, three eels appeared.
Category: 10 years and under category.
Photographer: Jamie Smart, Uk
Title: The Weaver’s Lair
Location: Mid-Wales, UK
Jamie Smart discovered ab orb-weaver spider curled up inside it’s silky web, it happened in the morning of cold September
She said that It’s also quite special for me because I get to show something that people are usually afraid of
Category: The Bigger Picture
Photographer: Sebastian Frölich
Title: Vanishing Pond
Location: Platzertal, Tyrol, Austria
When Austria has lost 90% of peat bogs, a fragile wetland played vital role as a carbon sink and a habitat for diverse wildlife, photographer said when he visited at Austria’s Platzertal moorlands.
Category: 11-14 years
Photographer: Lubin Godin, France
Title: Alpine Dawn
Location: Col de la Colombièr, France
During an early ascent, Lubin Godin found an Alpine ibex resting above a sea of clouds. He retraced his steps as the sun broke through and captured the scene before the mist returned.
Category: Underwater
Photographer: Ralph Pace, USA
Title: Survival Purse
Location: Monterrey Bay, California, USA
An image of swell shark egg case, captured by Ralph Pace, this image revealing a glowing embryo, complete with gill slits and a yolk sac.
Category: Animal Portraits
Photographer: Philip Eger, Italy
Title: Shadow Hunter
Location: Naturns, South Tyrol, Italy
Philipp Egger observed this eagle owl’s nest from afar for more than four years.
Among the world’s largest owls, eagle owls are about twice the weight of buzzards. These nocturnal hunters nest on cliffs or in crevices and often return to the same site for many years.
Category: Bird’s Behavior
Photographer: Qingrong Yang, China
Title: Synchronized Finished
Location: Yundang Lake, Fuijan Province, China
Qingrong Yang captured a a silver ladyfish executes a perfect, subsurface strike, stealing a meal right from beneath the little egret’s bill.
He often visits the lake to capture these frenzied feeding moments
Category: Behavior: Mammals
Photographer: Dennis Stogdill, USA
Title: Cat Amongst the Flamingo
Location: Ndutu Lake, Serengeti National Park, Tanzania
Caracals are known for their acrobatic leaps to catch birds, but sightings of them hunting flamingos are rare.
Category: Photojournalism
Photographer: Jon A Juárez, Spain
Title: How to Save a Species
Location: Ol Peteja, Nanyuki, Laikipia county, Kenya
After years dedicated to the BioRescue Project, Jon A. Juárez captured a historic moment: the first successful transfer of a rhino embryo into a surrogate mother. While the Southern White Rhino fetus, seen here, sadly succumbed to infection, this monumental feat validated rhino IVF, igniting a powerful new hope in the desperate race to save the critically endangered Northern White Rhino from extinction.
Category: Behavior: Amphibians and Reptiles
Photographer: Quentin Martinez, French Guiana
Title: Frolicking Frogs
Location: Kaw Mountain, French Guiana
In heavy rain, the photographer captured metallic sheen of lesser tree frogs gathering to breed by following a flooded path to a pool in a forest.
Category: Photojournalist Story
Photographer: Javier Aznar González de Rueda, USA
Title: End of the Round-up
Location: USA
Javier Aznar González de Rueda unearthed society’s fraught tango with the rattlesnake, a creature simultaneously reversed and ruthlessly persecuted.
Category: Behavior, Invertebrates
Photographer: Georgina Steytler, Australia
Title: Mad Hatterpillar
Location: Torndirrup National Park, Western Australia
Photographer captured the caterpillar of the gum leaf skeletonizer moth is a hairy little creature that keeps it’s old head capsules and stacks then in it’s head.
Category: Ocean: The Biggest Picture
Photographer: Audun Rikardsen, Norway
Title: The Feist
Location: Kvœnangen Fjord, Skjervøy, Norway
Rikardsen captured swarm of gulls around a fishing vessel.
Category: Plants and Fungi
Photographer: Chien Lee, Malaysia
Title: Deadly Allure
Location: Kuching, Sarawak, Bernio, Malaysia
Carnivores pitcher plants are reflecting with the help of UV lights, photographer used a long exposure and UV torch.
Category: Rising Star
Photographer: Luca Lorenz, Germany
Title: Watchful Moments
Location: Germany
Luca Lorenz photographed a swans who is still mute, on an Urban lake.
Category: Natural Artistry
Photographer: Simone Baumeister, Germany
Title: Cought in the Headlights
Location: Ibbenbüren, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany
Baumeister captured an orb-weaver spider’s shadow in the traffic lights.
Category: Photojournalism
Photographer: Fernando Faciole, Brazil
Title: Orphan of the Road
Location: CETAS (Centro de Triagem de Animais Silveatres), Belo Horizonte, Brazil.
A photographer captured a stray anteater while it was chasing it’s caregiver.
Category: Portfolio Award
Photographer: Alexey Kharitonov, Russia
Title: Visions of the North
Location: Rusia
By using drne, a photographer captured the frozen lake which is rapidly changing from summer to winter across tagia tagia forests and Arctic tundra.
