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Photograph by Fritz Hoffmann
From "Glacial Rocks," National Geographic, March 2012Looking as if it fell from the sky, a 40-ton erratic stands on the Colville Indian Reservation in Washington State. Such boulders are sometimes called rubbing stones because bison scratched up against them.
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Photograph by Thomas P. Peschak
From "Arabian Seas," National Geographic, March 2012In winter young whale sharks come to feed on plankton in the nutrient-rich waters of the Gulf of Tadjoura, off the arid coast of Djibouti. The world's largest fish—weighing more than an elephant—is becoming a symbol of Arabia's bountiful, but largely unprotected, marine heritage.
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Photograph by Brent Stirton
From "Rhino Wars," National Geographic, March 2012A rhinoceros stands on a hillside in KwaZulu-Natal Province.
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Photograph by Ed Kashi
From "Marseille," National Geographic, March 2012Marseille, a port city since 600 B.C., has offered refuge to wave upon wave of immigrants. The Mediterranean metropolis of more than 850,000 is home to 100,000 foreigners from Algeria, Italy, Morocco, Tunisia, Turkey, and beyond.
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Photograph by Joel Sartore
From "Visions of Earth," National Geographic, March 2012Uganda—On a lodge terrace in Queen Elizabeth National Park, a photographer's butter and roll prove irresistible to the local lunchtime crowd. East Africa is home to many species of weaverbirds, known for their skill in building nests.
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Photograph by Thomas P. Peschak
From "Arabian Seas," National Geographic, March 2012Rarely visited, the reefs off Saudi Arabia in the northern Red Sea are some of the most undisturbed in the region. Sunlight penetrates deep into the clear waters, enabling lush gardens of corals to flourish along these wave-washed coasts.
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Photograph by Fritz Hoffmann
From "Glacial Rocks," National Geographic, March 2012Yeager Rock (at right), in north central Washington State, helped geologists map how far south the ice sheet pushed—and provided a surface where local graduates could paint important dates.
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Photograph by Thomas P. Peschak
From "Arabian Seas," National Geographic, March 2012A relic of the Iran-Iraq war, this oil tanker was scuttled near the Kuwait-Iraq border on Saddam Hussein's orders, to block access by sea to southern Iraq. Kuwaiti authorities are reluctant to remove the vessel for fear of damaging the wetlands of nearby Bubiyan Island, an important fish nursery and seabird breeding ground.
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Photograph by Fritz Hoffmann
From "Glacial Rocks," National Geographic, March 2012The erratic in the foreground tumbled from a mountainside onto Mendenhall Glacier in Juneau, Alaska. Sliding downhill, sometimes two feet a day, the ice will eventually crumble, dumping its rider into Mendenhall Lake.
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Photograph by Thomas P. Peschak
From "Arabian Seas," National Geographic, March 2012The ordeal of nesting over for another year, a loggerhead turtle paddles into the surf of Oman's Masira Island. The island is a critical breeding area for this endangered species. As the turtles return to the sea, they must evade a gantlet of fishing nets.
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Photograph by Green Renaissance/WWF
From "Rhino Wars," National Geographic, March 2012Blindfolded and tranquilized, a black rhino is airlifted in a ten-minute helicopter ride from South Africa's Eastern Cape Province to a waiting truck that will deliver it to a new home some 900 miles away. Designed to extricate the animals gently from difficult terrain, the airlifts are part of an effort to relocate endangered black rhinos to areas better suited to increasing their numbers as well as their range.
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Photograph by Fritz Hoffmann
From "Glacial Rocks," National Geographic, March 2012Glen Rock, New Jersey, is named for its 570-ton erratic. Scientists believe a glacier brought it from about 20 miles north. The Lenape Indians, who inhabited the area, had another idea. Their name for such a rock was pamachapuka—stone from the sky.
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Photograph by Bruce Farnsworth
From "Visions of Earth," National Geographic, March 2012United States—With aquatic tails plus full sets of legs, western spadefoot tadpoles display the magic of metamorphosis. Just days away from terrestrial life, these pollywogs will not eat until their tails are completely reabsorbed into their bodies.
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Photograph by Gary Stubelick
From "Top Shots," National Geographic, March 2012A prolonged exposure let Stubelick, 58, create this July 4 photo in Boston. "I like the irony of a fire hydrant on fire," he says, "and a 'fire source' like sparklers implying water flowing from a fire hydrant."
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Photograph by Fritz Hoffmann
From "Glacial Rocks," National Geographic, March 2012A melting iceberg, calved from the snout of Alaska's Mendenhall Glacier, carries a passenger just a bit farther. This rock tumbled onto the glacier back in the mountains and rode the escalator down to Mendenhall Lake.
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Photograph by Thomas P. Peschak
From "Arabian Seas," National Geographic, March 2012A huge water-themed resort rises on Dubai's coast.
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