Awesome! The Smithsonian has launched a new database of over 200,000 photos captured by automated cameras around the world, showing what animals are up to when they’re not being weirded out by humans (just weirded out by automated cameras).
Smithsonian Wild, as its called, has candid shots of bears, birds, bobcats, and just about every other animal you can think of, even the ones that don’t start with “b”. As Smithsonian wildlife biologist William McShea explains:
This site provides the public a glimpse of what the scientist sees when surveying remote place. Not every photo is beautiful but every photo provides information that can be used to conserve wild animals. It is addictive to scroll through the photos at a single site and see the diversity that walks by a single camera in the forest.
Scientific curiosity! Conservation! Yes to all that. But some, like the above shot of the Jaguar prowling the Peruvian Amazon, are just examples of strikingly beautiful, human-free photography. [Smithsonian Wild via Boing Boing]