Sunny Sunday

A sunny warm Sunday brought large crowds to the park, so there wasn't much bird life on show.

One of the Long-Tailed Tits at the Lido brought insects to its nestlings.

A Goldcrest sang in a tree by the Long Water.

A Robin was singing in the corkscrew hazel in the Flower Walk.

The male Blackbird in the Dell was busy gathering worms for his young.

A Magpie in a blossoming hawthorn picked up a larva so small that you wonder why it bothered, but every little helps.

Speaking of hawthorn blossom, I can't resist showing a closer look at the double tree with pink and white flowers by the leaf yard. The two trunks are inches apart. Some bird must have deposited the pips of two different fruit here at the same time.

Feral Pigeons squabbled mildly over a slice of bread someone had thrown for them.

The young Grey Heron in the Dell, last year's offspring from the nest on the island, rested quietly in a patch of long grass. Perhaps it was hoping that a mouse would forget about it and stray within reach.

I haven't put up a picture of the two latest young herons for a while, as their nest is now almost hidden by leaves. But in this picture taken from across the lake you can just see that they're there.

Coots are building a nest in a planter in the Italian Garden.

However, the Coots on the double nest next to a Great Crested Grebe near the Lido seem to have given up -- at least for now, as these persistent birds will keep trying right into the summer.

The Egyptian Goose with seven goslings on the Serpentine saw a dog approaching, called loudly to gather her young around her, and took to the water out of harm's way.

The Black Swan is still constantly pursuing a female Mute Swan, and she continues to retreat from his advances.

The Mallard ducklings passed dangerously close to a Herring Gull. There are still four, but one had strayed out of the picture.

This is the silver koi which was dumped in the lake because it had an ugly face. We hadn't seen it for several years, but today it turned up at the Serpentine outflow.

Buff-Tailed Bumblebees rolled ecstatically in pollen in the pink rugosa roses in the Rose Garden.

There is a place on one side of the Flower Walk, just a few feet wide, where every year Speckled Wood butterflies appear. Sometimes you see two males fighting.