Combat between two male stag beetles, Italy, 2022. During the mating season, male stag beetles (Lucanus cervus) go into a frenzy, with lively but harmless clashes, in which bigger males often have the advantage over smaller ones due to their impressive mandibles. Longer larval development and genetic traits can increase the size of some individuals, but all saproxylic beetles are threatened by poor forest management, logging and dead wood removal to “clean” the forest. (Photo by Iacopo Nerozzi)

“The Tibetan Mastiff also known as Do-khyi (variously translated as “home guard”, “door guard”, “dog which may be tied”, “dog which may be kept”), reflects its use as a guardian of herds, flocks, tents, villages, monasteries, and palaces, much as the old English ban-dog (also meaning tied dog) was a dog tied outside the home as a guardian. However, in nomad camps and in villages, the Do-khyi is traditionally allowed to run loose at night and woe be unto the stranger who walks abroad after dark”. – Wikipedia

Photo: A man displays a Tibetan Mastiff he raised during the Tibetan Mastiff exposition on April 7, 2007 in Langfang of Hebei Province, China. (Photo by China Photos/Getty Images)

“Tough Times for Orangutans”. Nature, first prize stories. Tim Laman, USA. Location: West Kalimantan, Indonesia. A Bornean orangutan climbs over 30 meters up a tree in the rain forest of Gunung Palung National Park, West Kalimantan, Indonesia, August 12, 2015. The lives of wild orangutans are brought to light. Threats to these orangutans from fires, the illegal animal trade and loss of habitat due to deforestation have resulted in many orphan orangutans ending up at rehabilitation centers. (Photo by Tim Laman/World Press Photo Contest)

Attnedees dressed in Zombie outfits walk down the Gaslamp Quarter outside of the 2015 Comic-Con International in San Diego, California July 8, 2015. (Photo by Sandy Huffaker/Reuters)

A black-winged stilt patrols a reservoir in Jezreel Valley in Israel early April 2023. Their eggs are a golden colour mottled with brown. (Photo by Itamar Procaccia/Solent News)

A military instructor teaches a schoolboy shooting with Kalashnikov rifles, during a training session at a military unit of the National Guard of Ukraine in western Ukrainian city of Lviv on February 15, 2022. (Photo by Yuriy Dyachyshyn/AFP Photo)

A colorful sky at sunset over the snowy mountains in Immenstadt, Bavaria, Germany, 20 November 2014. Cloudy weather is forecast in the region on 21 November. (Photo by Karl-Josef Hildenbrand/EPA)

Sulphur miners haul sulphur up an arduous path out of Indonesia’s Ijen volcano. The average carry out of the volcano is 70 kilograms per load per miner. The all-time record carry was 120 kilograms in one load. Extraordinary numbers given most of the miners only weigh around 55 kilograms. Ijen volcano, Indonesia, 2012. (Photo by Hugh Brown/South West News Service)