Wednesday 5 August 2020

The young Sparrowhawk was calling from the top of the plane tree by New Lodge, but was invisible in the leaves when I arrived. However, Takaki Nemoto had been there a few minutes earlier and got a fine shot of it in flight.


It was windy, and the young Little Owl had come down from its usual branches and was invisible in the interior of the tree. Its mother had also retreated inside one of the tall lime trees next to the nest tree, but there was a narrow window in the leaves through which she could be seen.


The usual Robin was waiting for me to fill up the feeder in the Rose Garden.


A view of the Grey Wagtail on the rocks at the top of the Dell waterfall.


The sunshine was warm enough for the Feral Pigeons to sunbathe.


A Great Crested Grebe on the Serpentine preened and flapped to settle its wing feathers.


The chicks at the west end of the island were happily swimming and no longer trying to climb on their parent's back.


The older chicks from the other end of the island were practising the greeting ceremony.


The grebe at the Diana fountain reed bed was sitting patiently on the nest. Actually it's not such a task as it is for some birds, since the pair take turns on the nest and relieve each other every half hour so that they can go fishing.


The Moorhen chicks by the bridge are growing fast.


In fact they are not the only Moorhen chicks at the bridge. This teenager was resting on the edge.


The Black Swan's ruffles were ruffled some more by the breeze.


One of the three Mute Swan cygnets on the Long Water flapped its tiny undeveloped wings.


A gaggle of Greylag Geese grazed near the Rima relief, with one keeping a lookout. Now that they can fly again they can range farther from the lake without worrying unduly about dogs.


The cardoons in the Rose Garden attract Honeybees as well as the bumblebees. They are quite hard to photograph as they tend to vanish into the purple spikes. Update: Conehead 54 tells me that the other bee is a Red-Tailed Bumblebee.


A Red Admiral butterfly clung firmly to a leaf as it was tossed around by the wind.

4 comments:

  1. Always a happy experience to see the usual Robin. Trusty, faithful little bird (so maybe it has a bit of self-interest in the matter, but still).

    You must be tired of hearing me say this, but every day I say, Grebe chicks cannot get any more lovable, and day by day they prove me wrong.

    To think that those puny little wings will develope into wings supposedly able to break a man's arm...

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    1. Swans' wings develop particularly late. This is useful, because swans are such unmanoeuvrable creatures in the air. If they could fly as teenagers they would surely crash into obstacles and kill themselves, but taking to the air is postponed till the last moment and this saves them.

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  2. Nice shots of the Sparrowhawk (good to see that this & Hobby have bred with you this year) & the Little Owl.

    The bumblebee on the Cardoon is a male (with the yellow collar) Red-tailed Bumblebee.

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    1. Thanks for the identification. I don't think I've seen one before.

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