To avoid having to hang upside down uncomfortably when eating berries ...

... a Rose-Ringed Parakeet can use a dextrous foot to hold a bitten-off twig ...

... or pull an entire bunch nearer so that it can be conveniently eaten.

There were also Blackbirds in the rowan trees on Buck Hill ...

... but the Mistle Thrushes kept their distance in the lime trees across the road.

A Nuthatch discovered that it could pick up two nuts at once, saving flying time ...

... until a Jay came down and ate the lot.

But you can't say no to such a beautiful bird.

A Blue Tit waited to be photographed before it was rewarded with a pine nut.

The female Little Owl near the leaf yard was dozing on the edge of her nest hole.

Then she went in and obstinately refused to come out for the people who had come to see her.

The hopeless pair of Egyptian Geese who have never managed to raise a single offspring in twelve years, were hanging around their nest site near the Henry Moore sculpture, and it looks as if they intend to produce yet another doomed brood.

Because the habitat of these birds straddles the equator, they have no idea of the seasons and breed when they feel like it.

A Great Crested Grebe was fishing under the bridge.

A Black-Headed Gull hovered, waiting to seize anything it could get.

A young Herring Gull was playing with a round seed, dropping it at the top of the sloping edge of the lake, letting it roll down, and catching it at the bottom. This simple game kept it amused for several minutes. Then it got bored and flew away.

I heard a report from someone who had been taking her dog to the vet yesterday when another person came in with an injured wader that had been picked up in Regent's Park. She said it had a very long downward-curving bill, so it must have been either a Curlew or a Whimbrel. The latter are often seen at Rainham Marshes, not very far downriver.