The female Tawny Owl flew into the lime tree where she parks her owlets during the day, carrying prey. She had mangled it severely, so it was hard to tell what it was, but probably some unfortunate fledgling. No sooner had she arrived than a Jay flew in and started screaming at her, so she moved to the adjacent plane tree, as seen in this picture.

When things had quietened down she returned to the lime tree and divided the food among her three owlets, which were making a tremendous noise in anticipation. Two of them were perched together. First the one at the back was fed ...

... then the front one. Their mother was hidden, and all you could see was the leaves moving as a large bird swept through them.

The male Little Owl was in the chestnut tree where the pair's nest is.

Not far away on the grass, a Magpie was feeding one of its young, which is on the left of this picture. They don't look much different from adults except that their tail feathers are not grown to full length.

There is a heavy growth of green water plants around the Coots' nest near Peter Pan, and the Mute Swans brought their cygnets to eat it. The Coots were alarmed by this intrusion, and the male bravely sallied out and attacked the female swan, who drove him off with one peck.

These Coots have lost their chicks, almost certainly to gulls, but still have some eggs left to hatch. However, any subsequent chicks are likely to go the way of the first lot. It was a rotten place to build a nest.

The people at Bluebird Boats report seeing a lot of dead and dying crayfish -- in the boats they get a good view straight down into the water. The last time this happened was in 2008 when workmen cleaning the Diana fountain accidentally flushed water contaminated with algicide into the lake; this killed all or almost all the crayfish, as well as the tiny Daphnia that play such a vital role in keeping the water clean. It's not clear what has happened now.

They have found dead crayfish in their boats, dropped in by gulls. And where they find them, they also find these mysterious little whitish oval objects, usually two of them. They appear to be made of something like bone or shell, and are about ¼ inch, 6 mm, along their long diameter.

Does anyone know what they are? Sorry about the low quality of this picture, which was the best I could manage without a close-up lens.