When Colin Garratt went to photograph the traditional sentinels of the British countryside, he found they ranged from the dapper to the downright sinister. “They are not from the anaesthetised world of the craft fair”, says Colin Garratt, “but are the direct descendants of the ancient spectres which have haunted the landscape for centuries”. The Scarecrow Exhibition is at Geddes Gallery, London, from 25 to 30 March. (Photo by Colin Garratt)

A Turkana tribeswoman reacts after an accidental fire of a shelter in Turkana settlement in Ilemi Triangle, Kenya, July 15, 2019. The Ilemi Triangle, a disputed sliver of land along the border with Ethiopia and South Sudan, is the northernmost tip of Turkana, Kenya's poorest county. A series of deadly clashes between the Turkana community and other ethnic groups that they said had crossed from South Sudan have put people on edge, to the point of posting lookouts. (Photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters)

Beautiful, strange and occasionally alarming pictures from the shortlist for this year’s Wellcome image awards – which celebrate the very best in science photography and imaging – from an x-ray of a bat to a micrograph of a kidney stone. The exhibition opens on 12 March at three science centres and the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester. Photo: Scanning electron micrograph (SEM) of an Arabidopsis thaliana flower, also commonly known as thale cress. Some of the anthers are open, revealing pollen grains ready for dispersal. Arabidopsis was the first plant to have its entire genome sequenced and is widely used as a model organism in molecular and plant biology. Horizontal width of image is 1200 microns. Magnification 100x. (Photo by Stefan Eberhard/Wellcome Images)

Castro's soldiers at Playa de Giron, Cuba, after thwarting the ill-fated US backed 'Bay of Pigs' invasion. (Photo by Graf/Getty Images). April, 1961

Syrian girls carry bags with bread as people queue up outisde a bakery in a rebel held neighbourhood in the northern city of Aleppo on July 12, 2016. Since mid-2012, Aleppo has been roughly divided between government control in the west and rebel control in the east, and has suffered enormous destruction in the war that has killed more than 280,000 people nationwide. Last week, a government advance brought regime troops within firing range of the Castello Road, the only remaining supply route into the opposition-held east, effectively severing rebel neighbourhoods from the outside world. With their route to the outside world cut, there is no new flour coming to the city's bakeries, and fuel to light their ovens is also now hard to find. (Photo by Karam Al-Masri/AFP Photo)

A police officer detains a person during protest by supporters of Pakistan's former Prime Minister Imran Khan against his arrest, in Karachi, Pakistan, 09 May 2023. Khan, the chairman of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, was taken into custody by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on 09 May outside the Islamabad High Court, where he had arrived to appeal for bail in multiple cases filed against him. The arrest came after Khan's ouster from power in April 2020 following a failed vote of confidence in parliament. (Photo by Rehan Khan/EPA)

Monkeys climb onto tourists during the annual Monkey Festival, after officials start capturing monkeys, in Lopburi province, Thailand, on November 24, 2024. (Photo by Patipat Janthong/Reuters)

An owl peeps out from behind a rusty piece of farming equipment in Teddesley Park, Staffordshire, UK in the last decade of July 2025. (Photo by David Akers/Solent News & Photo Agency)