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UPY 2026 Coral Reefs - Highly Commended
'Who's a pretty boy, then?'
Nicholas More
On a Red Sea reef, parrotfish are common and a favourite of mine due to their polly-chromatic colours and beautiful plumage. At night, these Norwegian Blues can appear resting, tired or shagged out after a long squawk but during the day, they can be observed bimbling around, biting chunks out of the reefs, whilst pining for the fjords.
They process their stony diet and ultimately excrete it as fine white sand, making Polly both a keystone reef species and a tropical beach realtor.
So…rather than taking photos parrot fashion, I chose a slow shutter speed to highlight their voomy, lackadaisical nature, whilst framing the coral prominently, to show their importance to the reef. Polly wanna cracker? :-)
Judge's comment: Perfect execution of a standard image in the Red Sea! All of this image just screams "coral reef" which is why almost all judges (I'm not saying who didn't like it ;-)) loved this image. Well done and excellent choice to enter it into this category!
Tobias Friedrich
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