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Headline: COVER IMAGES CHOOSE BEST PICTURES OF THE YEAR: British Wildlife Photographer Paul Goldstein Chooses His Pictures Of The Year

Caption: A British wildlife photographer has captured shocking scenes of a young jaguar playing with a discarded plastic drinks bottle in the wild. Guide and presenter Paul Goldstein photographed these disturbing scenes in the Pantanal, Brazil. ..... STORY COPY: British wildlife photographer Paul Goldstein has chosen his best pictures of the year. The Wimbledon-based guide and conservationist has had an exciting year in the wilderness. Polar bears, cheetahs, leopards, humpback whales, jaguars and pumas have all been captured through his viewfinder. "These quarries," he says. “Require patience, fitness and indeed an almost biblical-like obsession if you want to get anything like an acceptable photograph.” Paul, who guides for Exodus Travels (www.exodus.co.uk), explains: “I spend months, even years, researching destinations and animals yet even with this sort of dedication and fieldcraft, there will never be a perfect photograph. However, no true wildlife photographer would want it any other way. I like the challenge, the hardship and even the physical difficulties. The patience required is a must not a virtue as is the discipline and concentration. It is also important that you must be prepared to fail. An ambitious yet flawed image always has more impact with me than yet another safe one. I look for a lot in an image but always originality and indeed degree of difficulty is high on the list. Once or twice I have come close to the grail photographically, but I will never achieve it, but the pursuit will never die, nor hopefully the animals.’ "Sadly, many of these animals are threatened or even endangered which is why I have spent much of the last 20 years raising money for various charities associated with them,” he adds. Paul Goldstein is running the London and Everest Marathon next year dressed in his fabled nine-foot Bengal tiger suit to help raise money for his beloved striped predators. He has raised over £200,000 so far. He works and guides for Exodus travels and co-owns Kicheche Camps (www.kicheche.com) in Kenya.

Keywords: POTY

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