The week in wildlife – in pictures
Wild horses, an Ethiopian wolf and a dolphin attacking a porpoise are among this week’s pick of images from the natural world
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Pearl mullets, an endemic fish species found only in Van Lake in Turkey, jump through a waterfall during their spring migration. Pearl mullets are the only species able to survive in the salty, alkaline waters of the lake but swim upstream to lay eggs in freshwater rivers.Photograph: Sedat Suna/EPA
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A chequered skipper butterfly. The species has been reintroduced in a Northamptonshire forest in England after disappearing in 1976Photograph: Adam Gor/Butterfly Conservation/PA
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A bird rests on the head of a white-tailed deer roaming free in San Jose Villanueva, El Salvador.Photograph: Marvin Recinos/AFP/Getty Images
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A King Island brown thornbill is a passerine bird usually found in eastern and south-eastern Australia, including Tasmania. Residents of King Island fear the bird may be almost extinct.Photograph: Chris Tzaros/Birds Bush and Beyond
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Puffins on the Farne Islands off the UK’s Northumberland coast, where National Trust rangers have found numbers have plummetedPhotograph: Paul Kingston / NNP/National Trust
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A bottlenose dolphin lifting a harbour porpoise up in the air in a rare attack at Chanonry Point in the Moray Firth, Scotland.Photograph: Jamie Muny/PA
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Wild horses in Kosciuszko national park, New South Wales, Australia. The NSW Australian state government has decided to legally protect rather than kill thousands of wild Snowy Mountains Brumbies, although some scientists argue the feral horses are doing severe environmental damage to the country’s alpine region.Photograph: Courtesy of NSW Government
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Bear mother and cub playing in the winter forest, Alaska. The Trump administration is moving to reverse Obama-era rules barring hunters on some public lands in Alaska from baiting bears with bacon and doughnuts and using spotlights to shoot mother bears and their cubs hibernating in dens.Photograph: Volodymyr Burdiak/Alamy Stock Photo
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Reed parrotbill in Qingdao, east China’s Shandong Province.Photograph: Pacific Press / Barcroft Images
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Boys, who are experiencing the lives of Buddhist monks by staying in a temple for two weeks as novice monks, look at a tiger at the Everland amusement park in Yongin, South Korea.Photograph: Kim Hong-Ji/Reuters
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The Ethiopian wolf ( Canis simensis) is Africa’s most endangered carnivore, and arguably the world’s most endangered canid. Listed as endangered, this charismatic and elusive species exists only in the highlands of Ethiopia. This species has benefitted greatly from conservation efforts. Much of the wolf’s existing habitat is now preserved, and public awareness has caused threats from hunting to subside – making this one of the conservation actions celebrated by the IUCN on international day for biological diversity.Photograph: Tim Colston/IUCN
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A dhole, or Asian wild dog, that died in a snare in Mondulkiri Province in Cambodia.Photograph: WWF Cambodia
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The Great British Bee Count 2018: now in its fifth year, the count - which runs from Thursday 17 May until Saturday 30 June – is an opportunity for people to find out more about the many different bees that visit our gardens, parks and countryside, and what they can do to help them. This common carder bee was spotted in Southville, Bristol by Neil James Brain as part of the 2016 count.Photograph: FOE
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A stag with rope tangled in its antlers. The image has been used as part of a campaign to reduce the amount of marine litter in Scotland’s waters.Photograph: SNH/PA
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Smoked monkey meat is displayed at an open-air market during a vaccination campaign against the outbreak of Ebola, in Mbandaka, Democratic Republic of CongoPhotograph: Kenny Katombe/Reuters
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A pied parasol dragonfly in search of early morning prey resting on a blade of grass in Biodiversity Study Park at Thalawathugoda in Colombo, Sri Lanka.Photograph: M.a.pushpa Kumara/EPA
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A villager carries wood while a blackbuck runs on a field near Bhetnoi village in Ganjam District, in the Indian eastern state of Odisha.Photograph: Asit Kumar/AFP/Getty Images
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A weasel in its white winter coat in the Białowieża Forest, Poland. The population of white-coated weasels in the forest has declined sharply as climate change has reduced the number of snow-covered days by half, threatening the sub-species with local extinction, researchers have said.Photograph: Karol Zub/AFP/Getty Images
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A girl strokes a Hermann’s tortoise in a flat in Paris. An International Fund for Animal Welfare study found online sales of endangered animals are rife in EuropePhotograph: Francois Guillot/AFP/Getty Images
