Photo of the Day 17 December 2007

West Indian Manatee, Florida, 1999
Photograph by Wes Skiles
Like many creatures, the manatee's bulk—they can be as much as 13 feet (4 meters) long and 1,300 pounds (600 kilograms)—belies its aquatic grace. Also called sea cows, manatees are graceful swimmers that typically glide along coastal waters at 5 to 15 miles an hour (8 to 24 kilometers an hour). This West Indian manatee is wintering in a North Florida spring, attracted by the region's constant 72 degrees Fahrenheit (22 degrees Celsius) waters.

Photo of the Day 16 December 2007

High Tide Jump, Barry Island, Wales, 2001
Photograph by Vincent Musi
The boys of Barry Island, Wales, spend summer days seaside, anticipating exhilarating plunges into cold coastal waters. Bordering England for more than 150 miles (241 kilometers), Wales shares a long history with its neighbor. Despite its shared past, the country still embraces a unique culture of its own.

Photo of the Day 15 December 2007

Humboldt County, California, 1999
Photograph by Catherine Karnow
A car navigates a scenic stretch of California's Lost Coast. Bordered by dozens of peaks rising more than 2,000 feet (610 meters), the Lost Coast in Humboldt County hugs an 80-mile (130-kilometer) stretch of rugged coastline in northern California. The area also hosts the largest stretch of wilderness beach in the lower 48.

Photo of the Day 14 December 2007

Cullman County Fair, Alabama, 1996
Photograph by Randy Olson
A glittering swing ride gives county fairgoers an exhilarating aerial view of Cullman, Alabama, at twilight. Elkanah Watson organized America's first county fair in 1811 in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, to teach people about farming and animal husbandry. Today, fewer than 3 percent of Americans are directly engaged in farming, but county fairs endure as an opportunity to celebrate agricultural traditions.

Photo of the Day 13 December 2007

Silhouette of African Cheetahs, Africa, 1999

Photograph by Chris Johns

A striking silhouette shows off the lithe form of a cheetah approaching a tree for a late afternoon slumber. The fastest land animal in the world, cheetahs once thrived in Africa and Asia, but lion predation haunts their young, and farms and ranching have reduced their habitat. Today an estimated 12,000 cheetahs live in 30 countries, helped by conservationists.

Photo of the Day 12 December 2007

Red Fox, Denali National Park, Alaska, 2001

Photograph by Joel Sartore

In Alaska's Denali National Park, a red fox opens wide for a yawn. Foxes are masters of adaptation, allowing them to thrive despite environmental pressures. They live in forests, grasslands, mountains, deserts, and even human environments such as farms and suburban areas. They are solitary hunters that feed on rodents, rabbits, birds, small game—even fish, frogs, worms, and garbage.

Photo of the Day 11 December 2007

Blue Hole, Lighthouse Reef, Belize, 2002

Photograph by David Doubilet

Approximately 60 miles (100 kilometers) from Belize City, the almost perfectly circular Blue Hole is more than 1,000 feet (305 meters) across and some 400 feet (123 meters) deep.

The hole is the opening to what was a dry cave system during the Ice Age. When the ice melted and the sea level rose, the caves were flooded, creating what is now a magnet for intrepid divers. Today the Blue Hole is famed for its sponges, barracuda, corals, angelfish—and a school of sharks often seen patrolling the hole’s edge.

Photo of the Day 10 December 2007

Fruit Bats at Dusk, Zambia, 2007

Photograph by Frans Lanting

Epauletted fruit bats speckle a saffron-colored sky at sunset in Zambia's Luangwa Valley. Millions of these bats come to roost in the valley's trees and feed off the explosion of fruits during the rainy season, when the Luangwa River overflows its banks and transforms the dry, dusty landscape into an emerald wildlife paradise.

Photo of the Day 9 December 2007

Striped Cricket on Leaf, Southeast Asia, 2001

Photograph by Timothy Laman

Stripes meet stars in this night shot of a cricket in a Southeast Asian forest. In jungles throughout the world, the sinking sun summons a menagerie of rarely seen creatures that slither, leap, and buzz while the forest's more familiar creatures sleep.

Photo of the Day 8 December 2007

Acropolis, Athens, Greece, 2000

Photograph by James Stanfield

Built as the hilltop home of Athens's patron goddess, Athena, the Acropolis—and its most famous structure, the Parthenon, at right—recall the classical area of the ancient city-state that witnessed a brilliant flowering of art, architecture, philosophy, and democracy in the fifth century B.C. Today, government, tourism, and shipping dominate the economy in Greece's modern-day capital.

Photo of the Day 7 December 2007

Insect Eaten Leaf, Puerto Rico, 2004

Photograph by Peter Essick

Light permeates an insect-eaten leaf in Caribbean National Forest, Puerto Rico. The only tropical rain forest in the United States' national forest system, Caribbean National Forest is a 28,000-acre (11,330-hectare) preserve to the east of the capital, San Juan. It receives, on average, a whopping 15 feet (4.5 meters) of rain each year.

Photo of the Day 6 December 2007

Humpback Whale, South Africa, 2002

Photograph by David Doubilet

Forty tons of gleaming muscle, a humpback whale blasts out of the water near South Africa. Found in coastal waters worldwide, humpbacks are known for their magical songs, haunting sequences of moans, howls, cries, and other noises that often continue for hours on end. Scientists believe they communicate and attract mates through song.

Photo of the Day 5 December 2007

Car in Motion, Big Sur, California, 2000

Photograph by Frans Lanting

A car speeds past a rock formation on the roadside in Big Sur, California. Each year more than three million visitors navigate the treacherous turns of Highway 1 near Big Sur, drawn by the plunging gorges, fog-strewn coves, exploding surf, and tortuous geography—5,000-foot (1,524-meter) summits plummet abruptly to the ocean—of California's dramatic 90-mile (145-kilometer) coast.

Photo of the Day 4 December 2007

Coiled Jararaca Snake, Brazil, 2001

Photograph by George Grall

A young jararaca snake lies coiled on a mossy piece of ground in the Brazilian rain forest. These venomous pit vipers, members of the lancehead, or fer-de-lance, family, are common throughout their range and are responsible for a large number of snakebites in Brazil, Paraguay, and Argentina.

Photo of the Day 3 December 2007

Courtyard, Lucerne, Switzerland, 2003

Photograph by Brooks Walker

Switzerland's capital of dirndls and schnitzel, Lucerne is known for the Alpine charm of its snowcapped mountains, green vistas, and slice-of-life vignettes like this cobblestone courtyard.

The city of 60,000 sits in the center of Switzerland at the northwest end of Lake Lucerne. Encircled by a photogenic range of mountains and bisected by the River Reuss, Lucerne is beloved for its storybook charm.

Photo of the Day 2 December 2007

Monaco Cathedral, Monaco, 1996

Photograph by Jodi Cobb

Built in 1875 from white stone from La Turbie, a French alpine village, the neo-Romanesque Monaco Cathedral houses the tombs of former princes and Princess Grace. Monaco occupies a rocky strip of land on France's Mediterranean coast, but its size belies its reputation as one of the world's most upscale resort destinations known for glitz, glamour, and the good life.

Photo of the Day 1 December 2007

Honeybees, Maine, 2007

Photograph by Peter Essick

Swarming honeybees, like these on Maine's Appledore Island, frequently differ about where to establish a new nest. But the group usually chooses the best site. Bees reach this decision by gathering information, conducting independent evaluations, and holding a kind of vote. Scientists are studying such swarm intelligence—note the yellow and blue identifier dots on the bees in this photo—for clues about how humans might manage complex systems, from truck routing to military robots.

Photo of the Day 30 November 2007

Monkeys at Watering Hole, India, 1997

Photograph by Michael Nichols

A troop of Hanuman langur monkeys drinks from a watering hole used by tigers in India's Bandhavgarh National Park. Named after the Hindu monkey god Hanuman, these lanky, long-tailed monkeys are found in the humid forests, swamps, and even urban areas of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Myanmar (Burma).

Photo of the Day 29 November 2007

Dinosaur Fossils, Niger, 1997

Photograph by George Steinmetz

In Niger's Ténéré desert, a ridge of protruding bones suggests a dramatically different past. Millions of years ago, the parched plains of the Ténéré were spread with thick forests and broad rivers home to crocodiles, turtles, fish, and dinosaurs, including Suchomimus tenerensis, a recently discovered crocodile-like creature.

Photo of the Day 28 November 2007

Orchid, 2004

Photograph by Robert Clark

For legendary 19th-century scientist Charles Darwin, orchids, like the dew-beaded beauty shown here, epitomized the theory of natural selection, the belief that plants and animals evolve with traits favoring survival and reproductive success. By this measure orchids are a sensational success, with 24,000 species and 60,000 registered hybrids, far more than any other flowering plant on Earth.

Photo of the Day 27 November 2007

Aerial View, Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, Alaska, 2002

Photograph by Frans Lanting

The jagged University Range in Alaska's snow-draped St. Elias Mountains blushes red in the Arctic twilight. Many peaks in Wrangell-St. Elias National Park remain unnamed—and unclimbed—more than 20 years after the park was established.

Photo of the Day 26 November 2007

Butterfly on Leaf, Borneo, Malaysia, 2001

Photograph by Timothy Laman

Under the cover of darkness, a butterfly with folded wings rests gracefully on a leaf in the Danum Valley Conservation Area in Sabah, Borneo. The 170-square-mile (438-square-kilometer) conservation area is the largest undisturbed lowland rain forest in Malaysia, home to one of the world's most complex ecosystems.

Photo of the Day 25 November 2007

Swakopmund Dune Fields, Namibia, 2000

Photograph by Cary Wolinsky

Wind-sculpted dunes sprawl across the Sesriem and Sossusvlei dune area in Namibia's Namib Desert. The Namib is a cool, coastal desert that roughly translates to "an area where there is nothing" in the Nama language. It is known for its dramatic dunes, including the crescent-shaped barchan dunes shown here, some of which can reach 100 feet (30 meters) high and 1,200 feet (370 meters) wide.

Photo of the Day 24 November 2007

Sky Disk at Twilight, Germany, 2004

Photograph by Kenneth Garrett

Found buried in a hill in the town of Nebra in 1600 B.C., this 3,600-year-old sky disk reflects cloud-strewn skies in central Germany. The disk, which tracks the sun's movements along the horizon, contains the oldest known depiction of the night sky and may have served as an agricultural and spiritual calendar.

Photo of the Day 23 November 2007

West Indian Manatee, Florida, 1998

Photograph by Wes Skiles

A West Indian manatee drifts through crystal-clear water in a North Florida spring. Hundreds of these gentle giants migrate from coastal habitats to the springs each winter to bask in their constant and comparatively balmy 72-degree Fahrenheit (22-degree Celsius) waters.