Newly hatched at Fossil Rim Wildlife Center in Glen Rose, Texas, this Attwater’s prairie-chicken is part of a captive breeding program aimed at increasing the birds’ numbers in the wild. These charismatic birds once numbered about a million along the Texas coastline, but overhunting and habitat loss have cut their wild population to just 50 or so. Captive breeding programs like this one are trying to reverse the trend.
A cow cares for her newborn calf on a Mennonite farm in Elora, Ontario, Canada. Settled by Scottish immigrants in the early 1800s, Elora became an important agricultural town. The tiny village on the banks of the Grand River is now a haven for artists and a destination for tourists seeking the town’s tranquility and spectacular vistas. (Photo shot on assignment for, but not published in, “Ontario: Canada’s Keystone,” December 1978, National Geographic magazine)
Photograph by Michael MelfordObserver, a wooden-hulled, World War II-era minesweeper that has been converted to a 12-passenger cruising yacht, glides through glassy water in Alaska’s Inside Passage. This meticulously restored boat takes tourists through the heart of Tongass National Forest, 500 miles (800 kilometers) of sky-blue glaciers, grizzly bear tracks, wild beaches, bald eagles, spruce trees, and deep, mountain-ringed fjords.
Lisbon’s Alfama District rises dramatically to the base of the imposing Saint George’s Castle. The castle began as a Visigoth fortification in the sixth century and was taken over in turns by the Romans and the Moors. It was eventually captured by Portugal’s first king and became the royal palace. Tourists flock to the castle’s towers and ramparts, which offer unsurpassed views of the city below.