Manouevres at the bridge

The Great Crested Grebes with the single newest chick came down to the bridge, wanting to reach the better fishing ground on the other side. But they were opposed by the pair already in possession of the area, and at the beginning of the clip you can the grebe going into the threat posture with head lowered. The encounter failed at once and they had to go back.

This is one of the other pair, with a larger chick in tow, countering their advance. Chicks always attend these disputes, and so learn adult behaviour.

Two chicks watched from the other side of the bridge.

The two bigger Egyptian goslings at Fisherman's Keep have now lost almost all their juvenile down and are getting into the teenage stage.

The small one is some way behind. It was with its mother.

The father has an odd pattern on his face, with the usual brown eye ring broken up into a few dark marks. 

A young Grey Heron preened on dead branches in a holly tree beside the Long Water.

An adult flew over the little stream in the Dell.

A Rose-Ringed Parakeet ate the fruit in the big yew tree. They are messy eaters, chewing fruit for a moment to extract a bit of juice and then discarding it. This habit makes them very destructive, as they get through far more fruit than other birds.

One of the Blue Tits came out on the railings to apply for pine nuts.

The Coal Tits at the southwest corner at the bridge haven't been showing recently, and my last picture was taken in March. But today there was one waiting to take a pine nut from the railings.

One of the inevitable Jays was waiting at Mount Gate.

A pair of Jackdaws examined a nest hole in one of the old chestnut trees by the Serpentine Gallery. But this is the Little Owls' nest hole, and they'd get a nasty surprise if they tried to move in.

The male owl was in his usual plane tree a few yards away.

A male Great Spotted Woodpecker flew over and landed briefly in the top of a lime.

A Starling at the Lido restaurant tasted a pot of tartare sauce. It didn't like it, and peevishly turned the pot over.

The Grey Wagtail was again looking for insects in the slime under the Italian Garden. There are several snails in this picture. I think they may have been killed by the toxin from the cyanobacteria. A dead Mallard was floating in the water nearby, also probably poisoned.

The fox by the Vista was dozing, but got up to take some peanuts.

A nasty shade of turquoise

A Grey Wagtail hunting on the thick smelly mat of algae under the Italian Garden found a noisome larva. It seems that the problem with blue-green cyanobacteria is getting worse every year, and only moderately warm weather is needed to bring the stuff up. But there's really nothing that can be done about this, as any countermeasures would wreck the delicate ecology of the lake.

A young Blackbird, still with some gingery juvenile feathers, came down to the Dell stream to have a drink and wash its face.

A Blue Tit ...

... and a Coal Tit were in a sycamore sapling. They still haven't found a comfortable place to perch after the wanton destruction of the corkscrew hazel bush.

A Robin at Mount Gate was probably one of this year's young ones, with fresh adult plumage.

One of the regular Robins in the Flower Walk checked the sky overhead to see if it was safe to come over for a pine nut.

The male Little Owl at the Serpentine Gallery was showing off the magnificent eyebrows he inherited from his father, who was the smallest Little Owl with the biggest eyebrows I've ever seen.

It's impossible to go anywhere between the Flower Walk and the bridge without being picked up by the four Jays insistently demanding peanuts.

You don't often get a Carrion Crow and a Great Crested Grebe in the same picture. They were at Fisherman's Keep, and completely ignored each other. They live in different worlds.

The grebes from the east end of the island were each taking care of one chick. These two were not far from their nest ...

... and the others were at the far end of the island. The chick seemed uncomfortably close to a Cormorant, but in fact I've never seen much conflict between the species. A grebe is much quicker off the mark than a heavy Cormorant.

A chick on the Long Water got too pushy with a parent and was chased away.

One of the young Grey Herons from the fifth nest was fishing from the jetty at the Lido.

They are entirely independent now, and if you see a heron in that nest it's always an adult.

A Honeybee browsed on lantana flowers in the Rose Garden.

I think this black bee on a Michaelmas daisy is a Carpenter Bee, some species of Xylocopa. It wouldn't pose for a better picture and soon vanished into the dense clump. Later: a good suggestion that it might be Andrena scotica.

The gaudy flowers planted to cheer up the drab view of the bandstand lavatories include this strange Bird of Paradise Flower, Strelitzia reginae.

Chiffchaff in an oak

A Chiffchaff was calling and bouncing around in the top of an oak at the Triangle, and by chance came into view for just long enough for one snatched picture.

In the Flower Walk, that look that tells you to put down the camera and produce some pine nuts.

A Blue Tit in the yew in the Dell was also expecting prompt service.

A Jay rummaged for insects in wood chips laid down around the statue of Peter Pan.

Starlings at the Lido restaurant waited on the weathervane.

The male Little Owl at the Serpentine Gallery was on the usual branch in the plane tree.

At the Dell restaurant, Pigeon Eater strode up to chase rivals away from a bit of flatbread.

The Great Crested Grebe family from the north side of the island were by the reed bed east of the Lido.

The young Moorhen by the island looked round from the kerb. It's getting its adult yellow legs.

Cormorants clustered on the fallen poplar on the east side of the Vista.

It was a busy scene, with the Black Swan and 4GIQ at the edge ...

... and the single cygnet alone as usual, with no sign of its parents who were last seen on the other side of the bridge.

A Red-Crested Pochard drake, now in his smart breeding plumage, washed and preened, fluffing up his ginger bouffant with a foot.

A Tufted drake was well on his way to full breeding plumage with bright white sides.

More Shovellers have arrived.

The fox by the Vista is now well used to people leaning over the railings and throwing him food, and doesn't flinch even when a dog goes by, safely kept away by the railings.

A squirrel in the Dell reached down a willow twig to eat the tender leaves at the tip. Willow leaves are also liked by swans and geese.

A Buff-Tailed Bumblebee browsed on Michaelmas daisies in the Rose Garden.

Little Owls switching over

The new Great Crested Grebe chick could be seen from Peter Pan on the far side of the lake with its parents.

This fish was too large, so the adult ate it.

There are still plenty of small fish suitable for chicks. This is one of the two from the north side of the island.

The teenager from the Dell restaurant nest was still pestering its mother and got chased away.

It started fishing busily at Fisherman's Keep. It probably was catching some of the little fish at the edge, but these are small enough to eat without surfacing.

A Grey Heron joined a Mute Swan and some Coots on the remains of the nesting raft at the Triangle. This view from the other side of the lake shows that it is kept afloat by PVC drainpipe. This must have leaked, causing the raft to list more and more. The wooden structure behind it is the row of boxes of water plants at the edge.

The Black Swan and 4GIQ were at the landing stage by the Diana fountain. I heard that the former boss pair on the Long Water, 4HDW and 4DTT, had been seen on the Serpentine looking miserable. Who knows what disputes have been going on unseen by us?

The two dominant Black-Headed Gulls on the south side of the lake: The Czech visitor, visiting some people on a bench to tout for titbits ...

... and the one on the landing stage, which keeps away from humans.

When I first went past the Little Owls' plane tree by the Serpentine Gallery the female owl was looking down from the usual branch ...

... but when I passed again three hours later it was the male in exactly the same place. Yes, Little Owls can change their size by fluffing up their feathers, and they can adjust their eyebrows, but really there is no way that these two pictures can show the same bird.

Both the Peregrines were on the barracks tower, but the female was flying out from time to time and was away when I went by, so this picture shows only the male.

A sad event in the Dell: the corkscrew hazel bush which gave shelter to several small birds has been cut down. The Blue Tits ...

... and Coal Tits were flitting around confusedly trying to find somewhere comfortable.

A Grey Wagtail hunted by the Dell restaurant.

There are still quite a few Small White butterflies in the Rose Garden. One rested on a lantana.

A Common Wasp applied itself to an ivy flower at the back of the Lido.

A few warm days have brought out more cyanobacteria under the Italian Garden, and the breeze carried in their foul stench.