A starling jealously guards a seed station in the back garden of the photographer’s Michigan home in January 2024. (Photo by Lisa Cavanary/Solent News)

While many of us would pay good money for a spa mud bath, these fortunate hippos in South Luangwa National Park, Zambia, have nature to thank as they take a plunge in a lagoon in the second decade of February 2024. (Photo by Dimitar Nedelchev/Solent News)

An Afghan man cleans the his courtyard partially submerged in flood water following the flash floods after heavy rainfall in Guzara district of Herat province on March 13, 2024. (Photo by Mohsen Karimi/AFP Photo)

Demonstrators are assisted by members of Brigada Marabunta during a protest to mark International Women's Day, in Mexico City, Mexico on March 8, 2023. (Photo by Quetzalli Nicte-Ha/Reuters)

Contestants in the Miss International Queen, a transgender beauty pageant, in Pattaya, Thailand, on Saturday, August 24, 2024. (Photo by Andre Malerba/ZUMA Press Wire/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

A view of the cemetery where the graves of the soldiers who lost their lives in the Russia-Ukraine war are located as daily life continues in shadow of war in Kursk, Russia on August 18, 2024. (Photo by Vladimir Aleksandrov/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Artists perform during a slum party in Oworonshoki district of Lagos, Nigeria, 24 September, 2024. The slum party is a yearly artistic dance festival initiated by Ennovate Dance House. It highlights the positive sides of the slum community and brings hope to the inhabitants. (Photo by Emmanuel Adegboye/EPA/EFE)

A man tries to extinguish an advertisement board set on fire during a demonstration of French labour union members and workers, as France faces its 38th consecutive day of strike against French government's pensions reform plans, in Paris, France on January 11, 2020. (Photo by Gonzalo Fuentes/Reuters)