Actors perform during the ice sculptures festival “Ice Moscow” in Moscow, Russia, 06 January 2025. (Photo by Yuri Kochetkov/EPA/EFE)

A man takes a block of ice out of an ice factory for sale in Iraq's southern city of Basra on July 8, 2023. (Photo by Hussein Faleh/AFP Photo)

These may look like alien creatures from another planet, but the odd organisms are, in fact, colorful, microscopic life forms found in our forests. The bizarre slime molds, known as mycetozoa or fungus animals, were captured by geologist Valeriya Zvereva. She spent months documenting the common life forms that are found beneath our feet – but are rarely seen. Incredibly, the organisms can move and hunt for other microscopic life forms on which to feed. Zvereva, who is from Moscow, used a special macro lens to capture the vibrant and up-close shots, which show off the organisms’ unlikely beauty. (Photo by Valeriya Zvereva/Caters News)

A large molded bust of Edward Snowden is pictured in Fort Greene Park at the Brooklyn borough of New York in this April 6, 2015 picture provided by ANIMALNewYork. A group of anonymous artists erected the 4-foot-tall bronze statue of Snowden, the former U.S. spy agency contractor famous for leaking classified information, in a New York City park overnight, officials said on Monday. (Photo by Aymann Ismail/Reuters/ANIMALNewYork)

Stemonitis axifera is a species of slime mold. It fruits in clusters on dead wood, and has distinctive tall reddish-brown sporangia, supported on slender stalks. The species was first described as Trichia axifera by Jean Baptiste François Pierre Bulliard in 1791. Thomas Huston MacBride transferred it to the genus Stemonitis in 1889. Stemonitis fasciculata and Stemonitis smithii are synonyms.

A man removes ice from an ice-covered car with a hammer in Postojna, Slovenia, on February 5, 2014. Cars stand entombed in a crystal-like casing near the deserted railway station in Postojna. Trees and electricity pylons lie felled in the snow by the sheer weight of ice enveloping them. (Photo by Srdjan Zivulovic/Reuters)