Today's blog will be in two parts, early and very late. There is a late opening evening at Rainham Marshes, and I'm about to head off there.

But there was time for a quick walk round the park, and of course a sight of the essential Little Owl at the leaf yard, without whom no day is complete. Today it was the male who was sitting on the edge of the nest hole.

Young Great Tits were pestering their parents all along the east side of the Long Water.

And the usual Great Tits and Robins came to take food from my hand.

Two Grey Herons were keeping a lookout from the boathouse roof for anyone who might be bringing food for them.

There was a brief glimpse of a Reed Warbler in the reed bed by the Diana fountain.

The Great Crested Grebe chick on the Serpentine was out in the middle, calling to be fed.

Its mother was at the edge of the lake, not taking much notice.

That meant that the father was sitting on the eggs in the nest at the island. Grebes take turns to incubate, while the other one goes fishing.

All was quiet on the nest on the Long Water, and I didn't get a glimpse of the chicks.

The Mute Swan family on the island were ashore, preening.

The nest site in the middle of the island is the best one on the lake, surrounded by a fence with only one opening, so that even if a fox did swim over there would probably be plenty of time for the ever watchful geese to sound the alarm before it got in.

On one of the rafts at the east end of the Serpentine, a Greylag Goose was chewing a reed. It wasn't eating this tough thing. Perhaps it's like a dog gnawing a bone.