The two Common Terns are still on the Long Water, catching fish near the Italian Garden and perching on the posts offshore from Peter Pan. Here one of them scratches its ear with a very small foot. Terns are no good at walking, and don't sit in the water and swim like gulls, because their feathers are not waterproof. So their little feet really have the same role for them as a motorbike stand has for a motorbike -- just something to stop them from falling over when they aren't moving.

The smallest fish in the Long Water are not yet too large for terns, or for adult Great Crested Grebes. However, the adult fish are now finally turning their attention to spawning. Here some mirror carp (the kind with large scales) are getting rather excited in the Serpentine.

A Blue Tit was bathing at the top of the waterfall in the Dell.

It is good to see this place returning to its role as a bathing place for small birds. There is still not enough cover for them on either side of the waterfall after the bushes were destroyed, and the Goldcrests who were evicted by this act have not returned. But the ugly nurserymen's plants that were planted have now grow to a size where they provide a bit of privacy.

There was a lot of noise from the Goldcrests in the yew tree at the southwest corner of the Serpentine bridge. I am pretty sure that they are nesting here.

In the small reed bed nearby, a Reed Warbler was singing loudly. There was another Reed Warbler singing in the larger reed bed by the Diana fountain. As usual, I couldn't get a glimpse of either of them. A pair of Reed Warblers nested in the small reed bed last year, and it really is very small because it is the only surviving clump of a larger planting most of which died at once. I can't think why the birds preferred this tiny patch to the much larger one on the other side of the bridge; but they did, and raised a family which I was lucky enough to see.

The Little Owl was in his usual tree and I was taking the usual pictures of this irresistible bird when he suddenly coughed up a pellet.

The base of this tree is overgrown with brambles, so I couldn't find the pellet. Owls regurgitate the inedible parts of their prey, and since Little Owls live mainly on insects and small invertebrates, the pellets would presumably consist of legs and carapaces and beetles' wing cases. When the pellets of our local Tawny Owls were examined, they were full of the bones of mice and small rats.