Just a quick trip round the lake today, and an uneventful one. The male Little Owl was in his usual tree.

A Great Crested Grebe on the Long Water was giving a feather to a chick to protect its inside from spiky fishbones.

The rampant growth of duckweed has now spread to the east end of the Serpentine, along with some bright green algae, and some Moorhen chicks were swimming around in it.

Three Mute Swans were displaying to each other. It is not uncommon for swans to form trios, though only two of them are actually mates and the third is a male that just hangs around.

The white Mallard lent a bit of brightness to a dark morning.

Then off to Rainham Marshes with Johanna, and Tom, who is a volunteer there, showed us the sights. Johanna is trying to get a similar marsh bird reserve set up in her native California, and wanted to see how Rainham is run. There is much to admire and copy.

The water level was low and many of the waders had been scared away by two passing Peregrines. But there were some Lapwings flying around ...

... and some Black-Tailed Godwits.

Several Little Grebes could be seen from one of the hides.

A skein of Greylags flew one way while the Eurostar went the other way.

A female Kestrel perched in a tree.

A Hobby had caught a dragonfly and was eating it in flight.

A Common Darter dragonfly had escaped the bird's notice and was eating its own prey, a fly.

And a Migrant Hawker was resting on a reed stem.

This startling pinkish-mauve creature is a female Meadow Grasshopper. Apparently this colour is not unusual.

A Marsh Frog could be seen under the boardwalk.

And two Common Lizards were nestled comfortably together.

And here is something really common, a female House Sparrow -- except that we don't have any in the park, or in a wide area of Central London, and to see one is an event.