Monday 8 May 2017

A pair of Canada Geese on the Serpentine have one gosling, the first in the park this year. Its mother was strutting proudly about the Lido.


It's always a surprise that these sober coloured geese should have yellow goslings.


It was a cold day with a brisk northerly breeze, and Blondie's teenage goslings had gone into a huddle to stay warm, just as they did when they were little.


The Coots nesting on the basket seem to be stuck at two chicks, though there is still one unhatched egg in the nest.


I passed the Great Crested Grebe family twice, and the chicks refused to look out from their parent's comfortable back. But later Virginia went by and captured two of them in this splendid picture. Their mother had brought a fish much too large for them, and they were pecking at it tentatively but could do nothing. Eventually she ate it herself. Let's hope enough smaller fish are being found.


A Moorhen was tightrope walking on the fence of a raft.


The Grey Herons' nest on the island has now collapsed completely. Several herons could be seen indistinctly through the leaves in the next tree. Here is one young one and a parent.


Pied Wagtails were hunting along the edge of the Serpentine.


The Lido jetty is a little ecosystem. The Egyptian family cover it with plentiful droppings. Every morning these are swept up, but this just distributes bits in the ridged plastic mat. They accumulate insects, which the wagtails eat.


There are a great many insects flying over the lake, and a crowd of Swifts had come to hoover them up.


A Long-Tailed Tit in the leaf yard was looking for sedentary insects on the trees.


So was a Wren near the Italian Garden.


A Great Tit in the Italian Garden perched on a reedmace stem. This plant grows in only two of the ponds, and it seems to have arrived accidentally with seeds carried by birds from the reed bed at the east end of the Serpentine.


Someone had thrown down a lot of stale rolls beside the Serpentine, which Feral Pigeons were devouring. There was also a bagel, but they could make no headway with this rock-hard object and left it alone. A Magpie came down to see if it was edible.


Finding that it wasn't, the Magpie worked off its annoyance by chasing the pigeons.

8 comments:

  1. Was it very difficult to photograph the swift?

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    1. Autofocus set to 'focus priority' (fastest setting on the Pentax K-1), continuous (AFC), wide field. Autofocus distance set to 6m-infinity, which further speeds it up. Exposure set to 1/1000 second (would use faster on a brighter day). Take 150 pictures, throw away 149.

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  2. Ps where is the best place to see swifts in the park?

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    1. They were all over both lakes and the Round Pond today. This will probably continue for a while.

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  3. A crow was taking a keen interest in the gosling as I walked home last night. It did not appear to be an avuncular interest. Has the Albert Hall owl moved home? I haven't seen her for three or four weeks, morning or evening? Kim Fletcher

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    1. The Canada gosling's mother should be able to keep the Carrion Crow away, I trust. Yes, the Albert Memorial Little Owls do seem to have moved, and I haven't yet found their new place. See Tuesday's blog.

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    2. I guess a Canada would be able to keep even a large human away from its gosling, if youtube is to be trusted.

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    3. The Canadas on the lake are not too aggressive towards humans, not like fully wild ones. They are accustomed to getting their own way, and therefore quite mellow.

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