Chaffinches

The male Chaffinch at Kensington Palace was eating phlomis seeds.

A female Chaffinch in the corkscrew hazel in the Flower Walk, which has been misled by the mild weather into putting out catkins.

The teenage Little Owl at the Round Pond granted us another sight.

A Carrion Crow had a drink at the top of the Dell waterfall.

Another perched on the gilt copper ball on top of Kensington Palace. The palace was built in 1690, 59 years before Benjamin Franklin invented the lightning conductor. Probably some nasty experiences with this lightning-attracting ball led to the installation of the elaborate spiked conductor as soon as the news crossed the Atlantic.

Two Grey Herons on the Long Water stood against backgrounds of yellow leaves.

Moorhens can eat almost anything, and the debris drifted up against the edge of the Long Water provided a rather nasty snack.

The male Egyptian Goose in the Italian Garden made a remarkably clumsy attempt at mating, climbing on to his mate the wrong way round.

The pair of Mute Swans, just about tolerating having them in the same pool, gave them a contemptuous look.

The female of the dominant swan pair wasn't on the Long Water, and a Cormorant was occupying the island. She was probably on the Serpentine, where her mate had been expanding his territory.

We are wondering whether the missing male is actually one of the swans that was picked up with an injury and put in the holding pen in Kensington Gardens. He hasn't been been released yet, and Jon Ferguson is going to look at him when next he visits. He can be identified at close quarters by an old scar on his leg from a dog bite.

Mallards flew past an autumn tree beside the Serpentine.

The Japanese maple tree by the bridge is a brilliant red.

A curious crack in the sky created by an airliner flying through two spread-out vapour trails and cutting a negative trail in the vapour.