Thursday 7 June 2018

Glad to say I was wrong about one of the Great Crested Grebe chicks on the Serpentine having died. Their parents had taken one each, as they sometimes do when the chicks were half grown.


They were at opposite ends of the island.


When Tom and I went past later, he got this fine picture of one swallowing a large perch, which it just managed to do.


The Coot chicks at the Dell restaurant are now seldom seen together, but all five squeezed into this picture.


At the island, a Coot was keeping its chicks in the safety of one of the wire baskets that were supposed to contain water plants (thought most of these have died or been eaten). The chick can be conveniently fed through the mesh.


Mesh can be useful in other ways. A Coot near the Lido felt brave enough to threaten a Mute Swan because they were separated by a stout net.


A swan at the island was carrying one of her cygnets ...


... until she climbed ashore and it fell off.


Some of the moulting Greylag Geese are already regrowing their flight feathers, which are emerging in their blue wrappings.


Another good picture taken By Tom at the island, of a Red-Crested Pochard simultaneously eating weed and flapping.


There was a Grey Wagtail at the island. Tom thought it was a juvenile, but the photograph shows a small dark patch at its throat and I think it's a pale adult female.


Lesser Black-Backed Gulls were washing in their usual place offshore from the statue of Peter Pan.


The freshly dug flower beds in the Rose Garden attracted several Blackbirds looking for worms.


Another Blackbird carried a mixed meal of bugs to the nest.


A Song Thrush sang in a holly tree beside the Long Water.


A pair of Magpies and a pair of Carrion Crows had a brief spat near the Henry Moore sculpture, where both have overlapping territories.


The roses in the Rose Garden are in magnificent bloom, but the bees aren't interested in them and prefer modest little flowers.

3 comments:

  1. Bees have good taste. Wild flowers are so much more elegant. Love the video!

    So very glad to learn that the Grebe chick is alive and kicking.

    The portrait of the Blackbird carrying all sorts of insects is fascinating. Great way to see what great natural insecticides they are!

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    1. Wonder how the Blackbird managed to catch the later arrivals while holding on to the earlier ones.

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    2. Think you explained this once before Ralph: a bird uses its tongue to keep hold of the existing catch. Jim

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