Monday 16 August 2021

It took two visits to find a Little Owl, but patience was rewarded and there was the female in her nest tree, tiny but regal.


A female Great Spotted Woodpecker explored a tree near the leaf yard.


There were two families of tits here, one of Great Tits still young enough to be clamouring for food but too deep in the bushes to photograph, and an older family of Blue Tits out in a tree. Here is one of the young ones.


Ahmet Amerikali found a young House Sparrow in Southwark Park. Sparrows are definitely advancing back into the centre of the city, especially from the south, and I've heard them in Battersea in places where there were none a couple of years ago.


A Grey Heron stalked along the edge of the undergrowth looking for a rat incautious enough to put its head out.


The young Grey Herons from the third nest on the island are now climbing around more adventurously, and I was surprised to see that there are three of them, one more than I had thought.


This still picture makes it a bit clearer.


A young Lesser Black-Backed Gull hitched a ride on a rowing boat, to the amusement of the people in it.


A young gull fished up a promising morsel only to find that it was leaves. Gulls don't like salad.


Young Black-Headed Gulls are prettily patterned.


A Cormorant near the Serpentine island washed and jumped on to a post to dry. Of course it had to be a post with a Black-Headed Gull on it, because knocking other birds off posts is fun, for both Cormorants and gulls.


There was a female Mandarin on the island in the Long Water, where there were also four young Lesser Black-Backs pestering an adult.


There was also a pair of Gadwalls, the first I've seen in the park for a while.


The two surviving Great Crested Grebe chicks are growing fast.


You don't often see the tiny creatures that Moorhens pick up, but this teenage bird on the Serpentine had definitely found a larva on a twig.


Neil and I were wondering whether this was a wasps' nest or a canker on the sweet chestnut tree. Looking at it more closely, I think it's the second.

8 comments:

  1. Very good news about sparrows making a comeback, even if slowly. They are so cheery and playful, I hope you'll get lots and lots eventually.

    No wonder the two boat passengers are delighted with the visitor. Gulls are always doing something interesting.

    I hope I am not offending anyone, but female Little Owl always remind me of Queen Victoria: so regal, so rounded, so placid, and yet commanding-looking.

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    1. Queen Victoria was very little and round: 4 ft 11 in (1.5 m) tall, and in later life 5 ft 0 in (1.52 m) around the hips. It is not necessary to be tall to be commanding.

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  2. Lovely portrait of the Little Owl. Good to see Gadwall back, though the male looks quite scruffy in eclipse plumage.

    I'm absolutely besieged by House Sparrows in my garden-probably c30 birds with quite a few juveniles being fed by their parents.

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    1. Gadwall arrivals on the lake seem to be completely random, apart from the time before the madness when garden parties at Buckingham Palace used to drive then out into Hyde Park.

      I remember the big flocks of House Sparrows that used to follow the milkman's horse, who was called Paddy. How sensible to deliver milk with a horse and cart -- you don't need to drive the horse, he knows the round and keeps up with you.

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    2. I'm jealous of Conehead's sparrows.
      What a lovely image in my head now of horse and cart and sparrows.

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    3. We had gas streetlamps lit by a lamplighter on a bicycle with a long pole. It was another world.

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    4. You should try having breakfast at an outdoor cafe here. Sparrows have to be aopeased if you want to have your toast at peace.

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    5. In Richmond Park it's Jackdaws on the café tables. Charming but hard to deal with.

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