2017年「カエルを救え！」写真コンテストの受賞者

We are pleased to announce the winners and honorable mentions of the inaugural SAVE THE FROGS! Photo Contest! The contest received 132 entries from 35 participants. The participants hail from 12 countries (Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, France, Nepal, Netherlands, Puerto Rico, South Africa, South Korea and the USA). Without further ado, we are pleased to announce the 2017 SAVE THE FROGS! Photo Contest Grand Prize Winner:

2017 Grand Prize Winner

Angela de Wild
Netherlands
Photo: Common Frog (Rana temporaria)

Photographer Statement:
“My name is Angela. I have been fond of amphibians since childhood. I started taking pictures of them about 15 years ago. At the same time I became a volunteer for Dutch amphibian and reptile protection. The pictures are taken in Europe. With my pictures I try to express the beauty of amphibians, so others will love and preserve them too.”

Angela de Wild’s Grand prize Winning Photo of a Common Frog (Rana temporaria) 

Congratulations to Angela! Read on to find out who the Category Winners and Honorable Mentions are…and to see the finalists’ best photos!

THE CASH PRIZE:

Of the 35 participants who submitted photos to this year’s contest:

• 18 paid the $10 entrance fee to become eligible for the Grand Prize; and
• 17 entered free of charge and were thus not eligible for the Grand Prize, regardless of the quality of their photos.

This year’s jackpot, being based on the total number of paid entries, is thus $170.64, of which half ($85.32) will go to the Grand Prize Winner and half will be retained by SAVE THE FROGS! to support our amphibian conservation projects. Next year we hope more people will enter and pay the entrance fee so that the jackpot is even larger. Larger jackpot -> more publicity & more entries, creating a larger jackpot and thus more funds with which we can save frogs…and a larger jackpot for the Grand Prize Winner! 🙂

Category Winner: Best Salamander Photo

Angela de Wild
Netherlands
Photo: Southern Marbled Newt (Triturus pygmaeus)

Nearly a sweep for Angela! Great job!

Category Winner: Best Under 18 Photo

Eve Lambka
USA
Photo: Hey There! Gainesville, FL

Photographer Statement:
“I love the beauty of the world around me, so taking pictures captures that. I’m also a beginning photographer hoping to get better with each picture I take.”

Special Honorable Mention

Gert Benaets
Belgium
Photo: Spotlights (Oophaga histrionica in the dense forests of Chocó, Colombia)

Photographer Statement:
“As a child already I was interested a lot in amphibians and reptiles. Unfortunately, in my home country there are not a lot of these beautiful animals. So I travelled to South America for the first time in 2002 and I fell in love with the beauty of the rainforest and its animals. In the past years I travelled a lot to Central and South-America and started taking photos of that beauty, especially the amphibians passed in front of my cameras and lenses.”

Honorable Mentions

Lindsey Swierk
Pedro Peloso
Andreas Hertz
Vicky Flechas
Bruce Jones
Jan Zegarra
Choti Singh
Nick Gustafson
Rodrigo Calvo
Marta Miñarro
Alexander Murray
Neil Keung

No caecilian photos were submitted so there will be no Best Caecilian Photo winner this year! 🙁

Honorable Mention Marta Miñarro’s Hyalinobatrachium fleischmanni photo from Mexico. “I am a Master Student, studying Herpetology in Brussels, with a passion for macro-photography.”

The Gallery Of Finalists

Enjoy the Gallery of Finalists below! All these photos received votes of approval from at least one of our three judges. You can view a larger version of the gallery here. Click on any of the photographer’s info to expand the view and see all their honorably mentioned submissions.

Photo entry by Lindsey Swierk, Postdoctoral Fellow at Yale University, who says: “In spring 2017, the northeastern USA was stuck by a late-season blizzard that killed countless breeding amphibians and their eggs in vernal ponds. Wood frogs, which breed en masse for about a week each spring, were perhaps the hardest hit. This male wood frog was one of several I noted during the thaw that were clutching dead eggs at the surface of the pond. Despite the gloomy outlook, not all was lost: some of the eggs below the ice (bottom of photo) survived to hatch.” 

Thanks to all the photographers for entering the contest and congratulations to the winners and honorable mentions! Thanks to Kiana Zemenchik and Emily Moskal for their assistance with the contest. We hope you will enter next year’s contest and spread the word to your fellow photographers!