A Great Spotted Woodpecker called from the trees between the leaf yard and the Round Pond.
There was also a Green Woodpecker calling which I couldn't see.
Beside the Round Pond both the adult Little Owls called briefly, so I knew which trees they were in but still couldn't see them. And the owlet was hunkered right down in its hole, so it wasn't a successful photo op.
The female Little Owl at the Serpentine Gallery is seen less often, as the sweet chestnut where she liked to perch only has a few withered brown leaves left. I hope the rain has come in time to keep these 332-year-old trees alive, but they have endured worse in the much longer droughts of 1921 and 1976.
The female Peregrine was on the barracks tower. I haven't seen the male for several days. He may be on the Hilton Metropole hotel in the Edgware Road, their other daytime roost.
Neil sent a picture of a very tame Robin in the Flower Walk, which takes food from our hands.
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Mark Williams got this shot of a Long-Tailed Tit among rosehips at the Welsh Harp reservoir.
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I looked for the Mediterranean Gull and the Spanish Black-Headed Gull at the Round Pond, again without success. But the search turned up a returning Black-Headed Gull from Poland, Yellow TNX7 ...
... and a single Common Gull. We don't usually see these here till well into the autumn. It was trotting briskly among the smaller gulls which were just loafing around.
Grey Herons like to perch in cedar trees. The widely spaced horizontal branches give them a good view of the surroundings.
A Cormorant sprawled inelegantly on a post at Peter Pan.
A Moorhen chick stood on the dead willow under the Italian Garden. It's from a nest in the nearby reed bed.
The pair of Egyptian Geese whose territory is under the Henry Moore sculpture were annoyed by another Egyptian on their turf, and displayed in protest. The intruder dozed in the sunshine and took no notice.
A few months ago there were a lot of Gadwalls on the lake and I thought they were going to establish themselves as permanent residents. But then they all left. Today two returned, one drake on the far side of the Long Water ...
... and the other much closer at the Serpentine island.
A Buff-Tailed Bumblebee was kept busy by the many florets on a globe amaranth flower head in the Italian Garden.
The flowers were visited by various insects, including a small hoverfly which with Conehead 54's help I have identified as Eristalis nemorum.
There is something inherently funny in the egyptians getting their heckles up while the object of their ire remains cool as a cucumber enjoying a bit of sun.
ReplyDeleteMaybe the Spanish visitor decided to go back to Barcelona, unwise as that may be,
Tinúviel
There are hundreds of Black-Headed Gulls at the Round Pond, and at any time some of them are lying down or swimming, both of which prevent you from seeing whether they have rings. So even if the gull is there you have a large chance of not noticing it.
DeleteI briefly visited Kensington Gardens yesterday in the hope of seeing the juvenile Med Gull after 10am, but as you say no sign. There were 4 eclipse male Red-crested Pochard feeding together there on the Round Pond while a Mandarin sat on the edge.
ReplyDeleteThere seemed to be good numbers of returning duck on the Long Water with at least 45 Pochard, 9 Shoveler & 8 Gadwall, as well as 15 Cormorants.
Your "Batman Hoverfly" isn't one but one of the smaller dronefly species. I can't see the face but it's either Eristalis nemorum or E. arbustorum.
Thank you. I have a less good picture of the hoverfly which shows a black line down its face, so it's E. nemorum. What a romantic pastoral word nemus is, a grove, probably full of dryads.
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