Monday 3 May 2021

This is the first juvenile Robin I've seen this year -- and a very young one, barely out of the nest and still with a fluffy Mohican. The nest is near the bridge.


The Long-Tailed Tits near the Italian Garden are still busy feeding their young.


Tom found a second nest, also on the east side of the Long Water but nearer the Henry Moore sculpture, in a bramble patch under a hawthorn tree. The chicks were probably older, as their parents were bringing them large caterpillars. By the time I arrived the birds had started entering and leaving abruptly, so I didn't get a good picture.

But the scene was surrounded by other small birds -- a Chiffchaff ...


... a Great Tit in the hawthorn ...


... the usual pair of Blue Tits demanding to be fed ...


... and a Starling from the nests in the eaves of the Buck Hill shelter.


The mother of the three Grey Wagtail fledglings at the Lido was working herself to the bone catching insects to feed them. Their father showed up at the end and admires the scene from a buoy, but didn't help.


A Carrion Crow drank from a duckboard in the Italian Garden. All kinds of birds find the duckboards handy except ducks, which simply fly in and out.


When a Grey Heron decides to take over a Coot's nest as a fishing platform, there's nothing the Coot can do.


Another Black Swan has arrived on the lake, a young one still with grey plumage. We saw it from the other side of the Serpentine while photographing the wagtails, with the original Black Swan and possibly her mate.


Later they went to the Long Water. The original Black Swan has rejoined her mate and was following him as usual.


The new Black Swan is clearly a park bird, and came over to the Vista to be fed.


The male Mute Swan of the pair nesting next to the Lido restaurant attacked the Egyptian family with the blond goslings, which had got too close to his nest. Luckily there were no injuries.


The wind got up in the afternoon. A Mandarin drake bounced on the choppy waves on the Serpentine.


Some more fine pictures by Tom: Wrens mating near the southwest corner of the leaf yard ...


... a Whitethroat in the bramble and nettle patch near the Queen's Temple ...


... and a Cetti's Warbler at Rainham Marshes, where there are fifty of them but they're just as hard to photograph.

5 comments:

  1. I think I have seen more nightingales than Cetti's Warblers (in Spanish they are called more or less the same: ruiseñor and cetia ruiseñor).

    The video of the swan attacking the goslings is pretty alarming. They are harmless to the swan or his cygnets, should there be any. Why clear them out so violently?

    Something very endearing about the three little insatiable youngesters wagging their tails in almost harmony.

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    1. In Tuscany I have seen bushes crowded with nightingales making a tremendous noise all day and all night.

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  2. ~This is the first time I've looked at this blog and I'm really impressed. Thanks so much. It's good to learn from and fun to read.

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