Thursday 21 January 2021

It was a sunny but chilly morning. A Long-Tailed Tit posed on a branch with its tail sticking out behind it and invisible.

There are two Robins in the leaf yard, probably a pair in the breeding season. One will come to your hand to take food ...

... and the other won't. Thanks to Neil for the second picture.

A Goldcrest appeared in the leaf yard ...

... and another was singing in the Scots pines at the edge of the Rose Garden.

A Chaffinch emerged briefly from the holly trees near the bridge.

Jackdaws, with their small size and mild manners, are bullied by the larger and more aggressive corvids. This one got pushed off its branch by a Magpie and retired to a higher branch to finish its peanut.

The Peregrines were on and off the tower during the day.

The wind got up and the Grey Herons on the island came down from their nests. One sheltered behind the electric boat and went to sleep.

The young heron was in its favourite place on the gate.

The pigeon-eating Lesser Black-Backed Gull preened his immaculate feathers.

We may have a new pigeon killer -- not a gull but a crow. One attacked a pigeon on the edge of the Serpentine. The pigeon escaped, and it all happened to fast for me to get a picture, but I will be looking out for this crow now.

The Black Swan cruised on the Round Pond with its wings threateningly raised.

A sunny spell lit up a Gadwall at the Vista.

Birdseed is healthy food for ducks, but it sinks and the surface-feeding birds don't get much of it. That suits Tufted Ducks just fine, and they dive frantically to scoop it up.

4 comments:

  1. Doesn't the Long Tailed Tit look like the chibi version of itself?

    It was a matter of time before a crow learned how to kill pigeons. Scholars of mischief, they are.

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    1. I've already seen a crow kill a parakeet. They're working their way up.

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  2. Lovely portrait of the Long-tailed Tit. Also good you seeing the Goldcrests so frequently. It looks as though we're going to have some pretty cold nights this weekend so hopefully they'll find enough food to keep them going!

    The Black Swan looking handsome in the sunshine as does the drake Gadwall.

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    1. I often wonder how Goldcrests get through the winter at all. But without prolonged freezes in the past few years their numbers are increasing.

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