The week in wildlife

Cape Town, South Africa: An acraea butterfly sucks nectar from a mint flower in a valley of the Table Mountain national park in Cape Town, South Africa. The national park is part of the Cape floristic region world heritage site; nowhere else in the world does an area of such rich biodiversity exist almost entirely within a metropolitan area Photograph: NIC BOTHMA/EPA

A red robin lands on a tree branch in Clifton, Ohio. A winter storm spread a glaze of ice and snow from the southern plains to the east coast of the United States Photograph: Gary Landers/AP

A baby black howler monkey (Alouatta caraya) clings onto its mother's back at the Singapore zoo. Despite its name, only males are black while females and juvenile howlers are brown. The howler monkey is the loudest animal and largest monkey that lives in the South American rainforest Photograph: Wong Maye-E/AP

A deer is covered with frost after a night in the woods in Hudson, Wisconsin. An arctic blast moved into the American midwest, sending overnight temperatures plunging to -25C Photograph: Karen Bleier/AFP/Getty Images

An aerial view of the impact of the storm which has devastated the huge Landes forest in Moustey, south of Bordeaux, where thousands of timber businesses are based. Millions of people in southwest France and northern Spain struggled this week with destroyed roofs, fallen trees, power cuts and phone outages in the aftermath of a storm that killed 15 people Photograph: Regis Duvignau/Reuters

A volunteer rehydrates exhausted seagulls that have been brought in to a rescue centre near Bayonne following the last weekend's storm in southwestern France. Winds of up to 119 mph lashed the region Photograph: Bob Edme/AP

Anglesey Abbey, in Cambridgeshire, is famed for its carpets of snowdrops. But this year, the chilly winter has seen snowdrops flowering at the latest date for a decade. Head gardener, Richard Todd, said the flowers had bloomed two weeks later than normal, the biggest delay for 10 years Photograph: Chris Radburn/PA

A masked weaver builds its nest from the branch of a tree in Johannesburg, South Africa. Extensive summer rains have prolonged the breeding season for many species in the region Photograph: Jon Hrusa/EPA

Mei Xiang, a 10-year-old female giant panda, rolls down the snow-covered hill at the giant panda habitat in Washington DC's national zoo Photograph: Mehgan Murphy/AFP/Getty Images

This microscope image shows a plankton group three weeks after its fertilisation with iron on the research vessel 'Polarstern'. Seeding the oceans with iron is a viable way to permanently lock carbon away from the atmosphere and potentially tackle climate change, according to scientists who have studied how the process works naturally in the ocean Photograph: Philipp Assmy/EPA

A group of recovering brown pelicans sit on the edge of a wading pool in the aviary at the International Bird Rescue Research Centre in Fairfield, California. Hundreds of brown pelicans have been found sick or dead along the Californian coast since early January. It is thought unseasonable weather patterns may have affected the birds' eating habits Photograph: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Ramzar, a three-month-old Sumatran elephant, walks between his parents at the Elephant Conservation Centre in Way Kambas national park, Sumatra. Since 1998, 22 elephants have been born at the centre. The Sumatran elephant, the smallest of the Asian elephants, is facing serious threat from illegal logging and associated habitat loss and fragmentation in Indonesia Photograph: Beawiharta/REUTERS

A tame golden eagle chases a hare during a traditional hunting contest near the town of Karkaralinsk in central Kazakhstan. Kazakhstan's national sport of Sayat - or hunting with golden eagles - is popular in the Central Asian state. Berkutchi, or golden eagle hunters, come from all over the country for the annual competition Photograph: Shamil Zhumatov/Reuters

A seal grabs a fish in the River Tyne, Newcastle Photograph: Owen Humphreys/PA

Female gorilla Bilali with her baby Kakule in the Virunga national park, near the Ugandan border in eastern Congo. The first census of critically endangered mountain gorillas in the Democratic Republic of the Congo's Virunga national park since rebels seized the area has found that 10 babies have been born in the colony in the past 16 months Photograph: AP

A young male snowy owl on a beach in Long Island, NY. Biologists say an increase in snowy owl sightings across northern states suggests that the Arctic species is doing so well on its northern breeding ground that competition is driving the young ones south Photograph: AP

Dolphins swim along Copacabana beach in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The dolphins have been driven by cold tides reaching the shores of southern Brazil as result of the changes produced by the weather phenomenon El Nino, local experts say Photograph: Genilson Araujo/AFP/Getty Images

Oiled swans being washed. The Scottish animal welfare charity, the SPCA, believes oil from a derailed train in East Ayrshire has affected many wild birds. It is in the process of cleaning more than 20 oiled swans - rescued along with cormorants, geese and eider ducks Photograph: Murdo Macleod/Murdo Macleod

This image of a red damselfly, taken by David Chamberlain in Devon, has won a photography award from the Devon Wildlife Trust Photograph: David Chamberlain/Devon Wildlife Trust