Several Chiffchaffs were singing around the lake, hard to see in the bushes. This was the best picture I could manage, of one below the Triangle car park.

A Wren was also climbing around in the bushes.

It's much easier to photograph birds that come out to be fed, such as this Coal Tit at the other end of the bridge ...

... and this Robin at the Lido ...

... and a Jackdaw at the Round Pond, who had eaten one peanut and was expecting a second.

Other birds were feeding themselves. A Pied Wagtail was finding small creatures cast up by the waves on the edge of the Round Pond.

The feeders in the Rose Garden had run out, so the usual female Dunnock was on the path picking up little black grubs.

Also at the Rose Garden, three Feral Pigeons were bathing in a puddle.

During a heavy shower, a Carrion Crow decided that it wasn't wet enough and had a bath on one of the rafts at the east end of the Serpentine.

The tatty appearance of this raft is due to all the plants having been ripped out by nesting Mute Swans last year. The swans have now turned their attention to the other end of the raft, trampling down the fence and crushing the reeds.

However, that is a small thing compared to the devastation caused by humans. There used to be shrubberies around the terrace of the Lido restaurant, with attractive bushes that were home to a pair of Dunnocks, two pairs of Robins and a colony of Wrens, and which were frequently visited by flocks of Long-Tailed Tits. The bushes also acted as windbreaks for the people dining on the terrace -- the edge of the Serpentine is a windy place. Now all the bushes have been grubbed up. There is an architect's drawing on the site showing that they will be replaced by sterile beds of low cultivated flowers. So the birds are gone and the people will have their sandwiches blown away. It would be difficult to imagine a more destructive bit of planning, short of concreting the place over -- which was what the Hyde Park management proposed to do to the a large area at the bottom of the Parade Ground a few years ago, but luckily people discovered their plans and stopped them.

Two male swans were circling each other belligerently next to the terrace of the Dell restaurant.

One of the Canada--Greylag hybrid geese was eating young willow leaves.

At the island, the sitting Great Crested Grebe got off the nest, revealing at least one egg.

Blondie has lost one of her goslings, but still has six. I couldn't count them when I went past, as they were sheltering from the rain under their mother, but I was told later how many had survived.

The family at the Round Pond still have four.

There is now a pair of Mandarins on the pond, which have probably flown up from the Long Water.

No sign of a Little Owl today. They were wisely sheltering from the rain. The Mallards were back on the oak tree near the Albert Memorial during the morning, though they went away later.