Thursday 7 October 2021

Two Robins in the Flower Walk: one came out on the railings near Queen's Gate ...


... and the other was the usual bird on the usual twig in the corkscrew hazel near the Albert Memorial.


Neither of them would come to be fed, but the Great Tits were hungry on a chilly morning.



A Rose-Ringed Parakeet addressed the audience. It made far more sense than any of the speakers at today's Conservative Party conference.


A Wren paused for a moment on a fallen tree before dashing into a bramble patch.


The Coal Tit at the bridge waited patiently on a holly twig while I photographed it, then came to my hand for  pine nut.


A Long-Tailed Tit perched on a willow twig beside the Serpentine.


The young Grey Wagtail was looking for insects in the grooves of the non-slip matting on the Lido jetty.


The notorious pigeon-eating Lesser Black-Backed Gull was on the prowl at the Dell restaurant.


A stare from one of the two youngest Great Crested Grebe chicks on the Long Water.


The oldest teenager, now completely independent, has almost lost its juvenile stripes.


There were two teenage Moorhens on the rowing boats. We don't know what happened to the chicks after the family moved off the platform and found a new place underneath it. Maybe these are the young ones from there.


A Common Carder bee browsed on a patch of blue plumbago in the Rose Garden.


The ivy patch at the back of the Lido was mostly populated with wasps, but there was a single Batman hoverfly.


This fungus was growing near the battered old cedar where the path from the Albert Memorial crosses the Flower Walk. It has a small hole in the top, and I think it might be a young Cedar Cup before it opens out into a cup, but I'm far from sure.


Update: And indeed, I was completely wrong. It's part of a cedar cone lying upside down. Thanks to Mario for pointing that out.

Here's a picture I took earlier in the same place, showing a real Cedar Cup after it has opened.

5 comments:

  1. Any awful day will be made better by a Robin. If only they knew how beneficent they are.

    I'd vote for that parakeet. Way more sensible and intelligible than ordinary politicians (now I must wonder what a parakeed-led government would be like!)-

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  2. The penultimate photo is not a fungus, but (I think) it's the remains of a cedar cone. The hole is were the cone's central stem used to be.
    Mario

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    1. The cone's central stem is probably still attached to the branch up in the tree

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    2. Thanks for pointing that out. How expectation alters perception!

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