The mystery of how the fourth Great Crested Grebe chick appeared on the Long Water is explained. There are two families here: one with three chicks from the nest on the fallen poplar tree, and another with four from an oak tree overhanging the east side of the Long Water about 50 yards from the bridge. At least, that is where they spend most of their time, but the nest can't be seen from the shore or from the bridge. However, the secret of a successful nest is invisibility.

The pair of young grebes from the island were having a fishing lesson with their parents. They were not being fed, and were diving busily after their parents and learning where to look for food. It is not really a matter of deliberate teaching: the young birds follow their parents and learn by imitation. They are just beginning to grow their black top crests, but they will retain their stripy faces till early spring next year.

All five Moorhen chicks on the Italian Garden were still there, in spite of recklessly rushing about from one clump of plants to another. Mostly, though, they stay inside the enclosures and their parents feed them through the wire mesh.

I think there are only two Coot chicks in the nest in the Serpentine outflow. One was calling from inside, and the other standing on the edge preening, which made it possible to photograph it from directly above by leaning over the parapet.

Buck Hill is alive with crickets, which rise in clouds when you walk through the long grass.

This used to be a popular haunt of Mistle Thrushes, and sometimes you could see as many as twenty feeding in the grass. Then the big theatre tent was put up there and stayed in place for months, and the birds retreated over the road into Hyde Park, in the pleasantly neglected area between the road and the swampy little valley of the Tyburn Brook, and they have not returned. But they do come back briefly to eat the berries on the rowan trees.