Peering through the leaves

The female Little Owl at the Serpentine Gallery was in a difficult place in the plane tree, but it was possible to see her preening ...

... and stretching her wings, surpisingly large for such a small bird.

A Carrion Crow on a stump at Temple Gate clearly considered me an inferior being, though useful as a source of peanuts.

A pair of Magpies waited in the variegated holly tree between the bridge and the Vista, a useful lookout post as it has a lot of dead and leafless branches.

The Robin at the bridge seems to be female, as she sometimes does the wing-fluttering display when she wants a pine nut.

The female Coal Tit in the Dell, whom I indentified in the same way, seems to have learnt that she must stay still for long enough to be photographed before she gets fed.

A Great Spotted Woodpecker on the island ignored five hundred tons of A380 trundling overhead to Heathrow.

This young Lesser Black-Backed Gull must be Pigeon Eater's own offspring, as any other gull would be instantly chased off the roof.

All the posts at the island were taken when another Cormorant arrived, and it got a hostile reception from the occupants. Eventually it found a little stump to stand on.

A Grey Heron sunbathed on the shore ...

... and another was reflected in the stream as it fished in the Dell.

The single Great Crested Grebe chick was at Fisherman's Keep. So was its mother, who was completely ignoring it. The young bird is on its own now and expected to feed itself.

The Little Grebe chicks on the Long Water are fishing for themselves but still getting an occasional contribution from a parent.

Seven Egyptian Geese flew into the Rose Garden ...

... and landed on the Huntress fountain. This is the only source of water at the east end of Hyde Park, and gives them a place to drink without having to fly up to the main lake. The algae in the pool also seem to be palatable.

The local fox was dozing on the lawn under the Henry Moore sculpture.

A very late grebe nest?

There is a new Great Crested Grebes' nest on the Long Water. Even by grebe standards this is very late in the year, and they may not be serious about it. But, living on fish, they are more independent of the seasons than many birds.

The three chicks from the previous Long Water nest were out on the Serpentine with their parents.

One of the three Little Grebe chicks on the Long Water preened under the willow by the bridge.

It already has flight feathers.

Another was being fed.

The Egyptian Geese in the Italian Garden had occupied the Coots' nest again.

Cormorants shone in the sunlight on a fallen tree at the Peter Pan waterfront.

A Black-Headed Gull at Fisherman's Keep ate a bit of mango from a fruit salad that someone had thrown to it. It seemed to enjoy this unusual snack.

The female Little Owl at the Serpentine Gallery came out late in the afternoon and peered down over a branch of the plane tree.

The Coal Tit pair in the Dell were chasing each other through the corkscrew hazel. This is the male ...

... and this is the female with a little white patch over her eye.

Ahmet Amerikali found a Goldcrest here ...

... and a Wren by the Buck Hill shelter, where they are often heard but seldom seen.

Migrant Hawker dragonflies mated on a reed by the bridge.

A Common Drone Fly on a strawflower in the Rose Garden had a retinue of tiny bugs.

When I photographed this small wasp on on a Michaelmas daisy I thought it was an Ornate-Tailed Digger Wasp, Cerceris rybyensis, but the pattern on its abdomen doesn't match. I can't find any pictures of wasps with this narrow orange stripe on the black and yellow pattern.

A tiny Common Zebra Spider, Salticus scenicus, wandered over a notice at the Lido restaurant.

Fallen into the sere, the yellow leaf

One of the Jays at the Serpentine Gallery waited in a maple whose leaves were entirely withered and dry after the drought. We shall have to wait till next spring to find which trees have been killed and which have just shut down prematurely.

The male Little Owl looked down from the plane tree, whose leaves are in fairly good condition. One of the reasons why these trees are planted all over London is that they are very tough and not upset by adverse weather.

A large flock of Long-Tailed Tits worked its way up the edge of the nursery enclosure. The greenhouses are screened from public view by a band of trees and shrubs which are largely left to go wild, so it's a good place for small birds.

One of the Robins in the Flower Walk struck a grand pose on a branch.

The Robin at the southwest corner of the bridge waited on a clump of withered blackberries.

The dominant Black-Headed Gull on the landing stage looked vigilantly around his territory.

Pigeon Eater, on the Dell restaurant roof, was looking disarranged with a loose feather. He is still in the middle of his moult into winter plumage, which will tidy up the worn feathers on his back and restore him to smartness. Like all birds that need to fly all year round, he moults his flight feathers one at a time on each wing, so he is never grounded as a waterfowl would be.

Some of the Mallard drakes are now back in their breeding plumage, a sign of the advance of autumn.

The Egyptian Geese with three goslings came over to the north side of the Serpentine, far from their usual place at Fisherman's Keep. Perhaps their parents hoped they would find more people to feed them, and fewer dogs to endanger them.

Once arrived in the safe place behind the barrier, they all had a good preen.

The single cygnet on the Long Water was alone again, by the reeds under the Italian Garden.

A party of Coots had taken over the remains of the raft on the Serpentine where the Black Swan and his Mute mate nested. You can see how thoroughly swans trash anywhere they nest, with the hurdle fence that was around the edge torn to bits and the raft starting to sink at one end.

The Great Crested Grebe fed their chicks under the bridge. One chick caught an insect before diving. Of course whenever a parent surfaces with a fish there is a frantic run from all sides to grab it first.

The oldest chick on the Serpentine tried pestering its father, who took absolutely no notice.

Nor did a man in a pedalo, engrossed in his phone. It makes you wonder why people come to the park if all they do is look at their little screens.

The Little Grebe chicks were dispersed around the Long Water. One was fishing under an oak.

A Common Blue butterfly rested on a clump of purslane in the Rose Garden. While there have been plenty of Holly Blues this year, this is the first Common Blue I've seen.

A Common Wasp was busy on a cuphea flower. I've seen wasps on these flowers before, and wondered what they were doing. They can't get into the long narrow flowers, which a bee would pierce with its sharp proboscis to get at the nectar, but wasps don't have one. Can a wasp chew its way in?

Thrashing around the lake

Looking at this close-up shot of the Great Crested Grebe family from the east end of the island all seems calm ...

... but when you zoom out you can see the two-day mass swimming event on the Serpentine, which displaces all the water birds. The three families of Great Crested Grebes were crowded in at the edge. The second shot shows the chicks and a parent close to where their nest was on the edge of the island, but since then they have been far up the lake at the Lido where the fishing is better.

The single young grebe from the nest at the Dell restaurant, shown in the last shot of the video, is no longer being fed by its parents and is having to fend for itself. This is the most dangerous time for young birds, as fishing which was once play becomes a vital skill.

Looking at the spectacle of all those thrashing bodies is a reminder of just how bad humans are at swimming. Even squirrels do it better. This is an old picture taken in 2012 on the small primitive camera I had then, showing a squirrel which had fallen off a branch into the Long Water heading briskly for the shore, watched by a curious grebe.

Today's picture of one of the young Little Grebes and two Shovellers shows almost the same place opposite Peter Pan.

The Egyptian Goose family were not paticularly bothered by the event, as they stay close to the shore at Fisherman's Keep ...

... but most of the Mute Swans had to crowd on to the Long Water and the Round Pond. Here they are at the Vista ...

... with the lone cygnet. The two swans on either side of it were not its parents, and the one on the right is 4GIQ, the Black Swan's mate. The Black Swan himself was still on the Serpentine, touting for food at the Dell restaurant terrace.

The Red-Crested Pochard, Netta rufina, is originally a southern European duck, but the drakes' showy breeding plumage led to its being imported as an ornamental park bird. Since then a small feral population has established itself. In London they move around the various park lakes apparently at random, and you may see a dozen or none. All the Red-Crested Pochards in Kensington Gardens at present are drakes, but at this time of year they are in eclipse and have female-type plain brown plumage. Only their bright red bills and eyes show that they are male; in females both are dark brown. The one at the right in the thumbnail for this video is just beginning to get back to his breeding plumage with black and white sides and a big ginger bouffant head.

Pigeon Eater was preening imperturbably at the Dell restaurant.

A handsome specked Feral Pigeon rested on a ledge on the bridge.

The female Little Owl at the Serpentine Gallery was in almost the same place in the plane tree as where I saw her mate yesterday.

It wasn't a good day for seeing small birds, though I did get a glimpse of a Coal Tit in yew at the corner of the Dell.

Luckily here are four good shots by Ahmet Amerikali, taken yesterday. Two Goldcrests appeared in the Dell, apparently rivals ...

... and one of them flashed its bright crest at the other.

A Chiffchaff ...

... and a female Blackcap came out at the southwest corner of the bridge.

Michaelmas daisies in the Rose Garden are now the main attraction for the bees, and a Buff-Tailed Bumblebee was at work on one.