The 2022 Nature inFocus photo winners deliver spectacle and surprise

November 27, 2022

Nature InFocus Awards. Winner - Conservation Focus. Little Rann of Kutch, Gujarat. A growing feral dog population in the region has become a significant cause for concern, as portrayed in this image of two dogs attacking an Indian Crested Porcupine

Kapil Sharma

View 24 Images

1/24

Jury Selection - Young Photographer. Red Panda. Singalila National Park, West Bengal

Alankritha Kalingarayar

2/24

Jury Selection - Conservation Focus. A Bagworm Moth caterpillar builds a protective shell with the resources it has around it. Normally, this would include twigs, leaves and other natural debris. But here, the caterpillar has turned to plastic waste. Bangalore, Karnataka

Amith Kiran Menezes

3/24

Winner - Creative Nature. Cooch Behar, West Benga. At the start of the monsoon, as the first rains lash down on scorched earth, winged termites or alates emerge in huge numbers, with the singular purpose of breeding in what is known as the nuptial flight

Anirban Dutta

4/24

Jury Selection - Creative Nature. Wilpattu National Park, Sri Lanka. The Sri Lanka Junglefowl is an endemic species that is a common sight across the island nation. This close-up photograph of its wing is a confounding play of colours, if not for a certain photobombing winged friend

Ashane Marasinghe

5/24

Winner - Photographer of the Year, Portfolio. A Jaguar walks past a camera trap in the Mayan jungle of Quintana Roo, Mexico.

Fernando Constantino Martinez Belmar

6/24

Winner - Photographer of the Year, Portfolio. Jaguars are frequently seen around Mayan villages, ranches, and even in some urban areas

Fernando Constantino Martinez Belmar

7/24

Winner - Young Photographer. Khao Yai National Park, Thailand. Being opportunistic feeders, hawks eat everything from rodents, small birds, insects to bats

Jomtup Charoenlapnumchai

8/24

Winner - Animal Behavior. Off Trincomalee, Sri Lanka. A Striped Sea Snake latches onto its catch, making for a rare documentation of the reptile in action in the open sea.

Joshua Barton

9/24

Winner - Creative Nature. The Horned Desert Viper or Saharan Horned Viper is one of the most commonly seen snakes in the North African and Middle Eastern deserts

Kai Kolodziej

10/24

Kapil Sharma

11/24

Winner - Wildscape & Animals in their Habitat. The camera trap image portrays the peaceful coexistence of leopards with humans in Mumbai’s Aarey Colony

Kapil Sharma

12/24

Winner - Wildscape & Animals in their Habitat. The camera trap image shows a Barn Owl flying into an abandoned Mumbai Police van

Kapil Sharma

13/24

Winner - Animal Portraits. Kochi, Kerala. A female Purple Sunbird prepares to take off from the edge of a curved coconut frond

KM Anand

14/24

Jury Selection - Wildscape & Animals in Their Habitat. Lake Kussharo, Japan. Whooper Swans need ample space and spend a lot of their time swimming and foraging for food

Lakshitha Karunarathna

15/24

Winner - Animal Portraits. Dambulla, Sri Lanka. Elephants are a common sight along the river and in the paddy fields of Sri Lanka's north-central province

Lalith Ekanayake

16/24

Winner - Animal Portraits. Grand Bahama, The Bahamas. The Caribbean Reef Shark is an impressive and fast hunter

Magnus Lundgren

17/24

Winner - Animal Portraits. Longdong (Dragon Cave), Taiwan. A Black-spotted Porcupine Fish uses a Giant Barrel Sponge as a harbour away from the current

Magnus Lundgren

18/24

Winner - Animal Behavior. Maasai Mara National Park, Kenya. A Spotted Hyena has climbed on top of a termite hill, to make the most of what was available

Mangesh Desai

19/24

Jury Selection - Animal Portraits. Jardines de la Reina, Cuba. An American Crocodile in an archipelago in southern Cuba

Massimo Giorgetta

20/24

Winner - Conservation Focus. Sonitpur, Assam. The image portrays the ground realities of human-tiger conflict and emphasizes the need for empowering local communities to manage these situations

Nejib Ahmed

21/24

Jury Selection - Wildscape & Animals in Their Habitat. Hokkaido, Japan

Philippe Ricordel

22/24

Jury Selection - Creative Nature Photography. Pulicat Lake, Tamil Nadu. A bird's eye view of a wetland shows a large colony of flamingos shaped almost like a heart

RajMohan T

23/24

Winner - Animal Behavior. Cherthala, Kerala. Monitor Lizards will eat almost anything

Ratheesh Rajan

24/24

Jury Selection - Animal Portraits. Nelliyampathy Forest Reserve, Kerala. The flick of an Anamalai Pit Viper's tongue

Sandeep Das

View gallery - 24 images

The winners of the 2022 Nature inFocus Photography Awards feature a spectacular assortment of wildlife moments, including a rare glimpse of a jaguar prowling through a village in Mexico, a pair of feral dogs unexpectedly encountering a porcupine, and a hungry wolf taking on a termite mound.

Founded back in 2014 as a community platform to bring together like-minded nature photographers in India, the annual Nature inFocus competition has quickly grown into an impressive international photography contest. This year the contest garnered 21,000 entries from all corners of the globe.

“Every year, we see images that reveal new facets of our natural world while shining a light on pertinent global conservation issues," said Rohit Varma, one of the founders of the contest. "We are thrilled to see the growth in the number of participants and the geographical locations. It truly has become an international platform for wildlife photographers!”

Alongside the five straightforward categories – Animal Portraits, Animal Behavior, Conservation Issues, Creative Nature Photography, and Wildlife & Animals in Habitat – this year an overall Photographer of the Year award has been added that focuses on a portfolio of images. The inaugural Photographer of the Year went to Fernando Constantino Martínez Belmar, a photographer from Mexico.

The winning portfolio was titled Balam – The Endangered King of the Mayan Jungle. It told the story of the endangered Jaguar, which has been forced to engage with human settlements as its natural habitats have been destroyed through deforestation.

Other highlights from this year's contest also focus on the way apex predators have been confronting local communities of people. Nejib Ahmed's evocative Conservation Focus category winner shows a group of villagers near a tiger reserve in Assam panicking when one of the predators came too close for comfort.

"While the tigress ran amok, so did the people trying to flee the area," explained Ahmed of the encounter. "One villager tried to confront the animal and was inflicted with minor injuries. The tigress eventually retreated into the forest. The image portrays the ground realities of human-tiger conflict and emphasizes the need for empowering local communities to manage these situations."

Take a look through our gallery at more highlights from this year's contest.

Source: Nature inFocus

View gallery - 24 images