2010: Veolia Environnement Wildlife Photographer of the Year - Winner
Bence Máté (Hungary)
A marvel of ants
When Bence first tried to photograph leaf-cutter ants in action, he thought it was going to be easy. It wasn't, but relishing the challenge, he found out as much as he could about their complex society and spent hours watching and following them in the Costa Rican rainforest. 'They proved to be wonderful subjects,' says Bence, who discovered that they were most active at night. He would follow a column as it fanned out into the forest. Each line terminated at a tree, shrub or bush. 'The variation in the size of the pieces they cut was fascinating - sometimes small ants seemed to carry huge bits, bigger ones just small pieces.' Of his winning shot, he says, 'I love the contrast between the simplicity of the shot itself and the complexity of the behaviour.' Lying on the ground to take the shot, he also discovered the behaviour of chiggers (skin-digesting mite larvae), which covered him in bites.
Nikon D700 + 105mm f2.8 lens; 1/200 sec at f10; ISO 640; SB-800 flash.
Search the online gallery
Enter a keyword to search for images from the 2010 competition
Veolia Environnement Wildlife Photographer of the Year is co-owned by the Natural History Museum and BBC Worldwide.
All intellectual property rights in the Veolia Environnement Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition images are retained by the photographer. Any reproduction of the images without prior written consent will constitute an actionable infringement. For information regarding permission to use competition images please email us.