Лучшие фотографии по версии MSNBC за 2009 год.

Clemens Bilan / AFP - Getty Images. A real head-scratcher. Nadua, a golden-bellied capuchin monkey born on June 16, scratches his head at the zoo in Cologne, western Germany.


Yuriko Nakao / Reuters. Leapin' lemurs. A baby ring-tailed lemur cuddles with its mother in their enclosure at Ueno Zoo in Tokyo


Dmitry Kostyukov / AFP - Getty Images. Tainted waters. A duck swims through the oily waters of the Moskva River in Moscow. The Russian navy has admitted responsibility for a 500-ton oil spill off the south coast of Ireland this month, an Irish transport ministry spokeswoman said


Leonhard Foeger / Reuters. Bird-brained. A pelican is pictured in its enclosure on a sunny day at Schoenbrunn Zoo in Vienna, Austria


Scott Barbour / Getty Images. When pigs fly. Miss Porky Pig flies through the air during the pig racing and diving event Sept. 18 at the Royal Melbourne Show in Melbourne, Australia. The show has been taking place in Melbourne since 1848 and is Victoria's largest annual public entertainment event, expected to attract around half a million visitors in 2009.


Trevor Mcdonald / Zuma Press. Lying in wait. A whitemargin stargazer fish sits buried in sand waiting to ambush prey.


Mathieu Belanger / Reuters. Shaking it. A polar bear shakes its body to remove water at the St. Felicien Wildlife Zoo in St. Felicien, Canada.


Darryl Dyck / CP via AP. Jump, jive an' whale. Aurora, a 20-year-old beluga whale, swims with her calf after giving birth at the Vancouver Aquarium in Vancouver, B.C., Canada.


Stephane Danna / AFP - Getty Images. Hang in there. Zookeepers found Micha, a 15-year-old gibbon, in distress at the zoo of Frejus, southern France, after her twin baby gibbons were stolen July 14


Jim Young / Reuters. Howdy, neighbor. A horse grazes in a field beside a road in Crawford, Texas. The same Texas town that President George Bush moved to in 1999 during his run for the presidency in 2000


Rainer Jensen / EPA. Not easy being green. Polar bear Knut swims in common duckweed at the Zoo Berlin. Fans of Knut anxiously await the first meeting of Knut with 3-year-old female Gianna. Knut and Gianna are expected to first get used to each other and later mate.


Alan Berner / AP. Humming along. Rufous hummingbirds converge on one of the many feeders at a home in Hyak, Wash. This time of year, when the hummers are feeding heavily, the homeowner serves up more than 100 ounces of nectar a day.


Jason Lee / Reuters. Resting up. A giant panda sleeps in a tree at the Beijing Zoo.


Sascha Schuermann / AFP - Getty Images. Cold as ice. A Highland cattle stands in the snow on a pasture near Sonnenbuehl, southern Germany.


Georgios Kefalas / EPA. Three of a kind. Three Crab-eating macaques huddle together for warmth in sub-zero temperatures at their enclosure at Zoo Basel in Basel, Switzerland.


Nigel Treblin / AFP - Getty Images. On a roll. An ostrich eats a roll at the Serengeti Park in Hodenhagen, Germany.


Kham / Reuters. Ducking the issue. Ducklings huddle together at an incubating farm outside Hanoi, Vietnam. The nation's health officials have banned transportation of the birds by motorcycle in order to keep citizens safe from a potential bird flu outbreak.


Jeff Pachoud / AFP - Getty Images. Newfound friend. A newborn Madagascar lemur named Tahina hugs her toy at Besancon Zoo in France.


Zainal Abd Halim / Reuters. Leaf me alone. A frog sits on a banana leaf at a garden in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.


Wolfgang Kumm / EPA. A tiny bugaboo. A cockchafer sits on an apple tree in Berlin. Cockchafers appear from end of April on when they fly around seaching for delicate leaves of deciduous trees.


Chaiwat Subprasom / Reuters. Beyond the pale. An albino baby turtle swims with green baby sea turtles in a pond at Khram Island in Thailand.


Patrick Reddy / AP. Helping hands. A firefighter comforts Pencil, a horse that fell through the ice on a pond on Doug Oldiges' farm in Melbourne, Ky. Firefighters and members of the Northern Kentucky Large Animal Rescue Team rescued Pencil with plywood and slings to pull him out of the ice


Michael Urban / AFP - Getty Images. Taking flight. During the NATO summit, birds fly past rungs of a pedestrian bridge which connects Kehl, Germany, to Strasbourg, France.


Fernando Vergara / AP. Introducing ... Batdog! A dog barks though a hole in the wall of a Bogota, Colombia, hardware store decorated with a bat painting.


Nicky Loh / Reuters. Gold rush. Blood Red Parrot fish swim at the 2009 Taiwan International Aquarium Expo in Taipei.


Sanjeev Gupta / EPA. Kiss of death. A king cobra couple "kiss" at the Van Vihar National Park near Bhopal, India.


Steffen Schmidt / AP. The lion sleeps today. An Asiatic lion dozes in the sun at the Zurich Zoo in Switzerland.


Gleb Garanich / Reuters. High above the Big Apple. A pigeon flies over New York City.


John M. Steiner / The Jamestown Sun via AP. Frozen in motion. Max, a Chesapeake Bay retriever, leaps in the air, biting at flying snow thrown from a snow blower operated by his owner in Jamestown, N.D.


Newspix / Getty Images Contributor. Just hanging around. A baby chimpanzee plays in its enclosure at Taronga Zoo in Sydney.


Nigel Treblin / AFP - Getty Images. Mama's love. A baby giraffe stands next to its mother in the zoo in Hanover, Germany.


Mick Tsikas / Reuters. Taking a dip. Gentoo penguins swim in their enclosure at the Melbourne Aquarium.


Don Emmert / AFP - Getty Images. Going out on a limb. Birds roost high in a tree at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge in Merritt Island, Fla.


Dmitry Kostyukov / AFP - Getty Images. Those baby blues. Sled dogs play before a competition outside Moscow.


Winfried Rothermel / AP. Entwined lives. Storks huddle in their nest in Holzen, southern Germany.


Yuriko Nakao / Reuters. The Illuminati. Illuminated sardines swim in a tank during a Christmas show event at the Yokohama Hakkeijima Sea Paradise in Yokohama, Japan.


Mark Baker / AP. Heeeere fishy fishy fishy ... An archerfish latches onto the finger of a young tourist who lured it out of the water with bread on his fingertip during a visit to a fish farm at the Kilim Karts Geoforest Park on Langkawi Island in Malaysia.


Simon White / AP. Taking a leap. A dolphin is airborne as it follows in the wake of a fishing boat off the coast of Paihia in the Bay of Islands, New Zealand.


Janek Skarzynski / AFP - Getty Images. Just passing through. A duck passes under a bridge in the Royal Baths Park in Warsaw, Poland.


Russel A. Daniels / AP. Out to lunch. Odin, a white Bengal tiger, dives for a piece of meat at the opening of the new tiger exhibit at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom in Vallejo, Calif.


David Hecker / AFP - Getty Images. Think pink. A flamingo rests during a rain shower in its enclosure at the zoo in the northern German city of Osnabrueck.


Chris Helgren / Reuters. A shadow of itself. A blue morpho butterfly flies above the tearoom floor of Galleria Borghese's aviary in Rome. The gardens are hosting a springtime educational event entitled Tea with the Butterflies, which allows visitors to sip tea in an atrium filled with the colorful insects


Burt Jones Maurine Shimlock / Zuma Press. A sea change. A sea squirt colony huddles together near the Solomon Islands in the South Pacific Ocean.


Simon Maina / AFP - Getty Images. Local watering hole. Camels drink water from a well in the village of Yaa-Sharbana in Egypt.


Alexander Natruskin / Reuters. The cat's meow. A Canadian sphynx sits during an event at the Pets Fashion Week Russia in Moscow


Amit Dave / Reuters. Two of a kind. A pair of chameleons fight inside a park in the western Indian city of Ahmedabad.


Michael Urban / AFP - Getty Images. Pretty as a picture. A peacock butterfly sits on a butterfly bush (also called a buddleia) in a garden in Hohen Neuendorf, Germany. This butterfly is known for its striking colors and is found in temperate Europe and Asia.


Tan Tan / Polaris. Flocking together. Swarms of swallows perch on power lines in front of a residential apartment building in southwest China's Sichuan province.


Tom Dorsey / AP. Flat out. A squirrel spreads out in the shade at Oakdale Park in Salina, Kan on July 10. The temperature in Salina was in the mid 90s by the early afternoon.


Larry Madin / Reuters. I can see right through you. A transparent sea cucumber swims at a depth of 9,200 feet in the northern Gulf of Mexico. The permanent darkness of the ocean depths is home to a far greater range of animals than previously thought, scientists recently announced.


Robert F. Bukaty / AP. Star search. A curious golden retriever wades into a tide pool at Pond Cove in Cape Elizabeth, Maine.


Wu Xiaoling / Zuma Press. Just horsing around. Two horses fight on the grassland near Chifeng, a city in north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.


Pat Wellenbach / AP. Cold stare. Snow covers a dog's snout after it went romping outdoors in West Bath, Maine.


Deepa Shrestha / Reuters. What a yawn. A 2-day-old baby Siamang yawns at its mother's lap at the Central Zoo in Kathmandu.


Junko Kimura / Getty Images. Crazy (cute) like a fox. Baby fennec foxes cuddle close at the Sunshine International Aquarium in Tokyo. The small nocturnal foxes babies were born on May 17.


Hazir Reka / Reuters. Birds of a feather. A flock of starlings fly over Rahovec, Kosovo.


Michael Patrick O'neill / Zuma Press. Group decision. A goliath grouper, a protected and endangered species, swims near Jupiter, Fla.


Wong Maye-e / AP. Ho-hum. A Sunbird looks for nectar among hanging plants in a balcony in Singapore.


Ognen Teofilovski / Reuters. High flying. An egret flies over Dojran Lake in Macedonia. The lake survived an ecological disaster after a drought and excessive use of its water in the 1990s, which caused its water level to fall nearly 33 feet, and brought into question the survival of its flora and fauna, according to local media


Don Emmert / AFP - Getty Images. Elegant elk. Bull Elk stand together on the road between Banff and Lake Louise near Banff National Park.


John Javellana / Reuters. The eyes have it. A Philippine eagle owl rests at the Ninoy Aquino Parks and Wildlife Center in Quezon City, the Philippines. The center, which serves as a repository and rehabilitation facility for wildlife with the objective to release animals back into their habitat, also serves as a venue for public education and as a training and research facility for future veterinarians and biologists.


Matt Rourke / AP. An end in sight. A Canada goose gosling is seen along the banks of the Schuylkill River in Philadelphia.