A rescuer saves a resident from a flooded area in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China, July 2, 2016. (Photo by Reuters/China Daily)

Monks take pictures with their mobile phones of the mummified body of a monk at Puzhao temple in Quanzhou, Fujian Province, China, January 10, 2016. According to local media, the monk named Fuhou died three years ago at the age of 94 and his remains was placed in a vat and turned into a mummy as a sign of respect. (Photo by Reuters/Stringer)

Women wearing sunglasses pose for a group photo at a park in Beijing in 1980. (Photo by Reuters/China Daily)

A man carries a bag on his back in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, January 26, 2016. According to traffic police, over 2.9 billion trips will be made around China during the 40-day Spring Festival travel rush, which started on January 24. (Photo by Reuters/Stringer)

A bus goes through a flooded area in Jiujiang, Jiangxi Province, China, June 19, 2016. A week of torrential rain in southern China has killed dozens of people and forced relocation of tens of thousands of residents, media reported. (Photo by Reuters/China Daily)

While communism, collectivism, worms, dry rot and casual looting failed to destroy the majestic wooden churches of Russia, it may be ordinary neglect that finally does them in. Dwindled now to several hundred remaining examples, these glories of vernacular architecture lie scattered amid the vastness of the world’s largest country. Just over a decade ago, Richard Davies, a British architectural photographer, struck out on a mission to record the fragile and poetic structures. Austerely beautiful and haunting, “Wooden Churches: Traveling in the Russian North” (White Sea Publishing; $132) is the result. Covering thousands of miles, Mr. Davies described how he and the writer Matilda Moreton tracked down the survivors from among the thousands of onion-domed structures built after Prince Vladimir converted to Christianity in 988.

Merit: A Night at Deadvlei. The night before returning to Windhoek, we spent several hours at Deadveli. The moon was bright enough to illuminate the sand dunes in the distance, but the skies were still dark enough to clearly see the milky way and magellanic clouds. Deadveli means “dead marsh. The camelthorn trees are believed to be about 900 years old, but have not decomposed because the environment is so dry. (Photo and caption by Beth McCarley/National Geographic Traveler Photo Contest)

Runner-up. “The heavens opened and the streets around Shibuya, Tokyo, were suddenly drenched in even more colour and movement. I was taking photos (my friend was holding the umbrella) when I noticed this woman at the crossing. I’m pleased with the futuristic feel of the image”. (Photo by Katherine Bridgestock/The Guardian)