Merit Prize Winner: “A Well Earned Rest in the Sahara”. This photo of Moussa Macher, our Tuareg guide, was taken at the summit of Tin-Merzouga, the largest dune (or erg) in the Tadrat region of the Sahara desert in southern Algeria. Moussa rested while waiting for us to finish our 45-minute struggle to the top. It only took ten minutes of rolling, running, and jumping to get back down. The Tadrat is part of the Tassili N'Ajjer National Park World Heritage area, famous for its red sand and engravings and rock paintings of cattle, elephants, giraffes, and rhinos that lived there when the climate was milder. Photo location: Summit of Tin-Merzouga, Tadrat, Tassili N'Ajjer National Park, Algeria. (Photo and caption by Evan Cole/National Geographic Photo Contest)

Three white tigers cub born on January 05, 2020 stand beside their mother Orissa at the zoological park of Amneville, northeastern France, on March 9, 2020. (Photo by Jean-Christophe Verhaegen/AFP Photo)

A four-day old African spurred tortoise, Geochelone sulcata, one of eight babies, was place on the head of its mother in their enclosure in Nyiregyhaza Animal Park in Nyiregyhaza, 226 km east of Budapest, Hungary, 27 September 2011. This was the first time that offspring of an African spurred tortoise were born in this zoo. The eight babies hatched after 115 days, they are 5.5 cms long and weigh 25 grams. Spurred tortoise is the largest species of land tortoises in Africa, the weight of an adult animal may reach 80 kgs. (Photo by Attila Balazs/EPA)

Meet the real beach babes: the herd of pigs that live a life of luxury paddling in the crystal clear waters of the Bahamas, on August 28, 2013. (Photo by Caters News)

The rabbit population of San Juan Island, brought in to feed lighthouse keepers, got so big that in the 1930s foxes were introduced to kill them. Although they are red foxes, their coats can be orange, silver, black or multi-coloured. Picture date: September 2023. (Photo by Jun Zuo/Solent News)

Circus artists perform at the International Circus Show started in Avenue Habib Bourguiba in Tunis, Tunisia on June 23, 2022. (Photo by Yassine Gaidi/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

Two one-year old baby mountain gorillas play together in the forest of Bwindi Impenetrable National Park in southwestern Uganda on Saturday, April 3, 2021. (Photo by AP Photo/Stringer)

Goat herder Dana McGregor's goats Pismo, left, and Goatee surf at San Onofre State Beach, Calif, on July 11, 2012. McGregor started taking Pismo's mother Goatee to the beach, and it wasn't long before she was on a surfboard. When Pismo was born, McGregor put her on a board too, and she was a natural, he says. (Photo by Rod Veal/The Orange County Register via AP)