Monday 19 October 2020

More Common Gulls have arrived on the Round Pond for the winter. One of them had won a large piece of expensive cake from the café at Kensington Palace.

The conspicuous white 'window' on the wingtip of a Common Gull is less visible from below, and also I think this is a second-winter gull on which the white patch is smaller than on a full adult.

A young Herring Gull on the Serpentine was having a good time playing with a tennis ball. They love toys that roll.

The Lesser Black-Backed Gull which I recently filmed catching a pigeon was in its usual place below the Triangle car park. It had not succeeded in catching anything, and vented its frustration with a loud cry.

A Moorhen teenager was getting absolutely soaked under a fountain the the Italian Garden. Both Moorhens and Coots seem to enjoy this experience.

A Moorhen preened on a chain and then walked along it. They love balancing and climbing, and do it for its own sake even when they don't need to.

The very old Canada x Greylag Goose hybrid ate a dead leaf, which geese seem to like. Then it continued slurping at the surface of the water, as if it was picking up small water creatures. Although its legs are now very arthritic and obviously painful, it's feeding well and looking after its feathers, and has avoided the foxes.

After a dull and chilly morning the sun came out and showed off the fine iridescent head of a Mallard drake.

A Long-Tailed Tit paused for a moment on a hawthorn twig.

A Blue Tit perched in a treetop near the bridge ...

... and a Great Tit looked out from a deodar beside the Serpentine Road.

Both were expecting food, and got it.

A Robin sang on a busy path beside the Long Water, ignored by the humans passing by.

A Carrion Crow had found a crayfish claw in the Long Water and took it up to the Vista to deal with it. Both crows and large gulls seem to find these claws worth eating, though they must hardly contain any meat.

A Magpie tried to harass a Grey Squirrel into dropping something it was eating.

The squirrel took no notice at all, and the Magpie flew off frustrated.

A squirrel in a yew tree carefully nibbled off the sweet red outside of a berry and discarded the seed inside. The seed is poisonous, but it's not sure whether squirrels know this or whether they just don't fancy the large hard lump.

Patches of cyclamen grow along the east side of the Long Water. People buy this as a house plant, but actually it thrives in outdoor temperatures and soon dies in a heated room.

12 comments:

  1. I’ll pay a visit to the Common Gulls soon. I’m always pleased when they come back. I can’t think of anywhere else where it’s possible to get closer views of them

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    1. You should soon find plenty on the grass between the Round Pond and Kensington Palace.

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  2. There is a bigger-blossomed (and to my mind, too blousy) form of cyclamen that is bred for indoors . Much prefer the smaller variety.

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    1. Breeders of plants and dogs do tend to produce monstrosities.

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  3. I have killed several cyclamen plants in my day, sadly. Too much love, too much water, too much heat.

    How could anyone pass off and ignore a singing Robin?

    That Gull sure does have expensive tastes.

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    1. I can't see a cyclamen getting through a Spanish summer, no matter how much you denied it love or water.

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  4. The Cyclamen taken indoors are various forms of C. persicum (large & small cultivars)-these are tender so get killed in the frosts though they prefer a cool room & central heating will kill them. The plants in the photo are of the hardy Cyclamen hederifolium (Sowbread). In the spring you can often see naturalised C. coum in flower which has smaller more rounded leaves.

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    1. Thank you. The cyclamens in the picture have been here for years, over several frosty winters, and are continuing to spread. I think they were put in by an old Australian gardener, long retired and probably dead by now, who enjoyed a bit of unauthorised planting and understood what he was doing. The well established wild primroses and cowslips near the bridge are his -- the park management would never have thought of such a thing.

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  5. They are lovely Ralph. Good to have some gardeners who are passionate like this. Ants help spread Cyclamen as the seeds have a structure called an elaiosome attached to them which is rich in lipids & proteins, which attract the ants which then help the plant disperse- a process called myrmecochory!

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    1. Thank you. Myrmecochory is a wonderful word, 'the dance of the ants'.

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    2. I am reminded of Aristophanes's description ofthe convolutions of Agathon's new music, basically composed of long trills: "μύρμηκος ἀτραπούς", "ants' paths".

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    3. Which reminds me of the comment of an American tourist driving across Germany: 'Why do we keep following these signs to a place called Umleitung but we never get there?'

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