Annual Photo Contest

2022: The Network's First Photo Contest!

When you work in a national park day after day, week after week, for seasons at a time, you see a lot of cool things. Often, you also witness those things from perspectives that aren't accessible to the average visitor. At the same time, it isn't always easy to capture those amazing moments when you have a job to do, and when the cameras don't carry themselves. So to give staff and partners a little extra recognition for their efforts to bring us special sights from their days in the field, the San Francisco Bay Area Network started an annual photo contest in 2022. Check out the winning entires below, selected by 12 photography, communication, interpretation, and science professionals from throughout California and beyond (thank you, judges!)!

Grand Prize Winner: Wildlife Biologist Matt Lau

A female seal lays on her belly, while in the background a researcher observes through binoculars.
Marine Ecologist Sarah Codde checks the tail tag on a young elephant seal in Point Reyes National Seashore.

NPS / Matt Lau

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Category Winner, Fieldwork: Aquatic Ecologist Darren Fong

Person placing a measuring tape on an algae-covered rocky shelf just above the churning water of San Francisco Bay. The Bay Bridge and the San Francisco skyline are in the background.
Ecologists evaluate rocky intertidal habitat during an extreme low tide on Alcatraz Island, overlooking the city of San Francisco.

NPS / Darren Fong

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Category Winner, Landscapes: Lisa Schomaker, Botanist

Rays of warm sunlight shine through a grove of impossibly tall coast redwood trees.

NPS / Lisa Schomaker

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Category Winner, Vital Signs: Gavin Emmons, Wildlife Biologist

Head-on view of a falcon in flight, carrying a small squirrel in its talons. Out-or-focus in the background is a rough rocky cliff face.
Adult female prairie falcon carrying California ground squirrel prey, the primary prey species for prairie falcons in our area.

NPS / Gavin Emmons

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Category Winner, Video: Matt Lau, Wildlife Biologist

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Duration:
19.257 seconds

A western snowy plover tosses tiny stones or shell fragments towards its shallow nest in the sand, where it has already laid two eggs.

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Category Winner, Wildcard: Fisheries Biologist Michael Reichmuth

Close-up looking through the open mouth of a rotting salmon carcass atop a mossy boulder, beside a rushing stream. Warm sunlight filters through the forest in the background. Text along the top reads "Success is in the Eye of the Beholder".
Coho salmon carcass beside Olema Creek in Point Reyes National Seashore.

NPS / Michael Reichmuth

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Last updated: February 15, 2023

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