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British Wildlife Photography Awards 2018 Overall Winner

Paul Colley

Contrails at Dawn (Daubenton’s Bats)

Ghostly contrails reveal the flight paths and wing beats of Daubenton's bats. This image, taken at the Coate Water Country Park in Wiltshire, was shot with an infrared camera and lighting system to overcome the challenge of photographing the high-speed flight of these small mammals in the dark. The in-camera double exposure caught the foreground bat milliseconds before insect intercept. As these bats are a protected species, they were photographed in