Friday 25 May 2018

A Grey Heron perched in a tree directly in front of the upper nest on the island , which is more or less invisible from the ground. But you can hear the clattering call of a chick in the nest demanding to be fed.


Here is a distant view of the nest from the side. You can only see anything at all when one of the birds stands up, and so far I've only seen fleeting glimpses of adults.


It was a very quiet day in the park, and there wasn't anything new to see. The Great Crested Grebes at the island have abandoned their attempt to rebuild their nest on the basket, and were relaxing with the two chicks.


The Coot nesting under the balcony of the Dell restaurant obstinately stayed sitting down, and only one of the chicks was visible.


Looking from the bridge, you can see that the Coot nest on the netting covering the raft is now quite a large structure.


But it's not well placed, because as soon as the chicks go into the water they won't be able to get up again.

Usually when Coots nest in really idiotic places, such as on the open edge of the lake, they give up quite soon. But this nest on the edge of the Serpentine has been here for more than a week, and is quite large.


The Mute Swan on the Long Water was with her cygnets on the little island where she nested.


The swan mother on the Serpentine wasn't doing anything remarkable, but looked elegant cruising with her cygnets in tow.


One of the pairs of Canada Geese took their goslings to the Lido restuarant to tout for food from the diners.


The three Greylag families were together on the south side of the Serpentine.


Egyptian families can't get close together, because they are territorial and aggressive. There was one on the north side of the Serpentine ...


... one on the south side ...


...  and one by the bridge. This is the family with the blond father, and two of the goslings going to be blond adults if they manage to escape the gulls -- but that's a big if.


The blonde female Mallard was preening. You can see that the secondary feathers of her wings are brown instead of the iridescent blue of normal Mallards.


A Male Pied Wagtail on the Serpentine took time off from hunting insects to indulge in a bit of song.


Just as I arrived  at the Little Owls' tree near the leaf yard, a Magpie forced the male owl off his perch and he flew into the adjacent chestnut tree.


He intended to land on this branch, but a Wood Pigeon was sitting stolidly on it and he had to swerve off at the last moment.

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