Week in wildlife: orphaned owls, a shark threesome and a moose down a well

Catwalk strut … Magellanic penguins head for the sea, watched by an admiring crowd, after their release from a rehabilitation clinic in Punta del Este at the southern tip of Uruguay

A stag pursues a hind in a forest near Frankfurt, Germany

Tidy … a red squirrel in Wales. The Wildlife Trust of South & West Wales has launched a campaign in response to a proposed energy park development that threatens to destroy 40 hectares of forest, home to one of the last red squirrel populations in Wales. They were once a common sight in forests across the country, but now there are just three populations of red squirrels left

Two mountain gorillas play together in the forest of the marvellously named Bwindi Impenetrable Forest in southwestern Uganda. The national park there is home to half the world’s population of these endangered primates

An albino squirrel stands out against the greenery in Cape Town, South Africa

A bull moose trapped in an abandoned well is rescued by wardens in Maine, US. It was only spotted when one of the landowners noticed its antlers poking out from the undergrowth. He phoned the wildlife department, who sent a biologist to sedate the moose and a team to pull it to safety in an elaborate five-hour rescue. “Once the sedation wore off, the moose took off running, no worse for wear other than perhaps his bruised ego,” the wardens said.

In more moose news: Emil the moose, who became a social media sensation in Austria, has been caught and taken back to the Bohemian forest in the Czech Republic. The footloose moose, whose summer wanderings caused havoc on Austrian roads and railways, was sedated before being lifted by eight firefighters into a transport trailer lined with straw, leaving his legions of fans wishing him well online

This photo of a diver among sperm whales was a finalist in the “ocean adventure” category of the Ocean Photographer of the Year 2025. “We saw 15 whales socialising,” said the photographer, Romain Barats. “The sea was rough but when you get to see something like that, you quickly forget the conditions.”

A trio of leopard sharks in New Caledonia, Australia, has made marine science history after they were seen mating in a “threesome”. It is the first time the globally endangered species has been documented in what the Journal of Ethnology delicately called “group courtship/copulating behaviour”.

A heron takes flight during a misty autumn sunrise in Richmond Park, London, UK

Gannets diving next to the Bass Rock, an outcrop in the Firth of Forth, Scotland. Seabirds that have survived bird flu are continuing to reproduce, but low-breeding performance is a “serious concern”, researchers have said

A ladybird crawls on a soybean pod as harvest time approaches in Maryland, US

A female crab on a submarine power cable. Scientists from the University of Portsmouth’s Institute of Marine Sciences have found that female crabs show “significantly greater sensitivity” to electromagnetic fields from underwater power cables than males, which could affect how they migrate and where they lay their eggs

Bear 32 Chunk, as he is known, hunts for food in preparation for Fat Bear Week. The National Park Service in Alaska, US, holds an annual event highlighting the preparations made by the brown bears of Katmai as they get ready for hibernation

Bear 901, as he is known, hunts for food in preparation for Fat Bear Week. The National Park Service in Alaska, US, holds an annual event highlighting the preparations made by the brown bears of Katmai as they get ready for hibernation

Rhinos roam at the Ziwa rhino sanctuary, Uganda

An apprehensive green sea turtle has a tag attached to its flipper at the Greenfingers wildlife conservation initiative in Lagos, Nigeria. Two of the migratory turtles were rescued from poachers and will be released back to the ocean

This drone photo shows a humpback whale being disentangled from lines by the Sea World Foundation, supported by Orrca, off the coast of New South Wales, Australia

A hoverfly on a thistle flower in Dunsden, Oxfordshire, UK

Black-tailed godwits begin preparing for migration with the arrival of autumn in Bursa, Turkey. Using their long beaks, the birds extract underground prey such as worms, insect larvae and small crustaceans

Storks fly over fields near Frankfurt, Germany

These four orphaned barn owl chicks were found weak from hunger and thirst after their mother’s death in Diyarbakır, Turkey. They are being treated at Dicle wildlife rescue centre before being released into the wild