The rain song

The male Chaffinch near the Speke obelisk persistently gives a one-note call which is known as the 'rain song'. It's not the same as the normal male song and its purpose is obscure, but it's certainly not a warning of impending rain.

A Robin sang from a branch near the Henry Moore sculpture. I've seen him here with a mate, and then carrying insects, so he is certainly nesting and with luck we should see spotty brown young Robins here soon.

One of the Coal Tits in the Flower Walk  -- thanks to Ahmet Amerikali for this picture.

On the path below a pair of Feral Pigeons billed and cooed.

With gulls it's hard to tell courtship from rivalry, but I think these two Herring Gulls were getting along fine until one of them said something inappropriate.

The young Grey Heron from last year's nest looked for fish at the small waterfall in the Dell. Below the fall a Moorhen sat on a rock. The pair are on and off it, and it's not yet clear whether they intend to nest.

Great Crested Grebes had a territorial faceoff on the Serpentine not far from the bridge. I think the lone grebe facing the pair is the one from the Long Water side of the bridge, where they have been looking at nest sites. He wants to have a bit of territory the other side of the bridge so as to have access to the wire baskets full of twigs, which are now full of small perch hatched earlier in the year.

Coots are still trying to establish a nest near the Serpentine outflow, built up from the bottom in quite deep water on a massive heap of rotting waterlogged branches that you would have thought much too heavy for a Coot to haul. They have succeeded in previous years though only briefly, as the upperworks got washed away when there was a strong wind. But this year they are struggling to get anything to show above water at all. Maybe the foundations have subsided.

The Black Swan and his new Mute girlfriend seem to be firmly together now. As usual they were at the east end of the Serpentine.

The gate of the enclosure on the island has been opened to let in a swan wanting to nest. I think the wire mesh at the back is new, a fence to keep swans away from the reeds around the little pool in the middle of the island which otherwise they would wreck. This may be an idea from the new Wildlife Officer, Nick Burnham. I haven't met him yet but have heard good things about him. He quickly put barriers around the swans' nests on the edge of the Serpentine to keep the public from disturbing them.

The dominant male swan on the Long Water had chased all his rivals away under the bridge, and was resting on the gravel strip with a retinue of Pochards, plus a pair of Tufted Ducks at the far left of the picture.

Carp milled around at the Serpentine outflow. Some of the carp in the lake are very large, over 40 pound.

Bees of many species are fond of allium flowers. This is a Buff-Tailed Bumblebee in the Rose Garden ...

... and here is a Honeybee on a different coloured allium flower. Bees of all the species I've seen on flowers tend to stick to the same colour as well as the same species.

Pink and white horse chestnut blossom near the Serpentine Gallery.

The notices at the leaf yard saying 'Ground under repair' have been repaired twice over the years as the signs have disintegrated. 

Not so the ground which, fenced off from the public and neglected, has turned into a swampy jungle. The swamp was created partly by the trampling of hundreds of people flocking in to feed the parakeets, which compacted the London clay soil and made it completely impervious, and partly by the stupid piling up of leafmould behind the railings. intended to act as a mulch to keep the nettles down -- not only did it make the nettles thicker and add tall thistles, but it channelled rainwater down the front of the railings and it pooled at the bottom. The only way to remedy this would be to lay many tons of sand in the swamp to raise the ground level but that would be expensive, so the ground is simply left to run wild. It's probably better for the wildlife, but the park managers really ought to stop pretending to repair the ground and take those silly notices down.