More amazing image galleries of the year:
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2012: The year in wildlife
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- Furious flock
- This huge flock of red-billed queleas takes flight from near a watering hole in Kenya as a pair of elephants draws near. (Copyright: Antero Topp/Caters)
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- Bug's eye-view
- An Egyptian goose feeding in a park in Bad Schwalbach, western Germany, during the summer. (Copyright: AFP/Getty Images)
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- Red tide
- Sydney’s swimmers had to contend with a red tide of algae which closed beaches. The algae releases ammonia which can irritate skin and eyes. (Copyright: AFP/Getty Images)
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- White whale
- A rare white bull orca in a pod near the Commander Islands Reserve in eastern Russia. (Copyright: E Lazareva, via E Hoyt, Far East Russia Orca Project/Whale & Dolphin Conservation)
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- Back in the wild
- A baby pangolin is released back into the wild after being rescued from poachers in Indonesia. The animals are highly prized in China and Vietnam. (Copyright: AFP/Getty Images)
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- Buried at sea
- This unfortunate humpback whale was dumped into a seawater pool at Newport Beach, north of Sydney, Australia, after dying at sea.(Copyright: AFP/Getty Images)
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- Prize-winning penguins
- This image of bubble-jetting Emperor penguins in the Antarctic won Paul Nicklen overall title of Veolia Environment Wildlife Photographer of the Year. (Copyright: Paul Nicklen)
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- Pack of parakeets
- Animal hospital founder Harmesh Bhatt attends to a flock of recently hatched orphaned Alexandrine parakeets in his house in Ahmedabad, India. (Copyright: AFP/Getty Images)
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- Inside the mind
- A dissected chimpanzee head goes on show at the Grant Museum of Zoology in London in September. The teaching museum has a collection of 67,000 specimens. (Copyright: Getty Images)
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- Curious seal
- Alexander Mustard shot this picture of a seal swimming off Lundy Island in the Bristol Channel. It featured in the British Wildlife Photography Award (Copyright: Alexander Mustard)
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Striking images of nature in 2012, from red tides to prize-winning pics of penguins and seals.
