The end of the Wasteland, the start of a new year

The Blackbirds in the Rose Garden shrubbery are very shy and elusive, but I managed to catch a male when he came out in the open for a second.

A Robin was doing its best to be heard over the grisly Christmas songs coming from the Wasteland. But today is the last day of the funfair, and tomorrow the loudspeakers will be silent and the noise will come from enormous lorries hauling the dismantled rides and stalls away down the Serpentine Road. The vast mess takes weeks to clear.

This Robin was in a relatively peaceful place next to the busy road passing Mount Gate.

There was also a Blue Tit ...

... and I found a Coal Tit in the Flower Walk for the first time in months, perched in the corkscrew hazel bush. It must be a different one from the pair often seen here earlier this year, which have disappeared. It didn't want to come down to be fed: Coal Tits need a lot of reassurance before they will approach.

Not so Great Tits, which confidently dart out of the bushes everywhere.

I'm always happy to give peanuts to Jays, but it's good to see one finding a larva by itself.

The Peregrines were on the tower in the morning. I haven't seen them here for a while.

But there was no sign of a Little Owl at the Round Pond, and sadly I heard from Belinda that she had seen the intruding squirrel in the hole this morning. We may not make contact with these owls till the next breeding season. Well, we have had a very good run of sightings and I'm amazed it lasted so long.

One of the nesting pair of Grey Herons on the island waited to change places on the nest. When one is sitting in the nest it's often invisible from the shore, but continued activity shows that they're still going ahead.

A Common Gull perched on a plastic buoy at the Lido. When I went round the Round Pond yesterday I was surprised to find only a dozen Common Gulls instead of the expected 40 or 50. There are never many on the main lake, so it's been a bad year for them.

A second-year Herring Gull, beginning to get some light grey feathers on its back, played with a rotten conker it had dredged up.

The edge of the Serpentine by the Lido restaurant is screened from the terrace by a line of large planters, so birds can hunt for food undisturbed by humans. Here are a Pied Wagtail, a Dunnock and a Moorhen searching for small larvae.

One of the young Moorhens in the Italian Garden preened and stretched on the rail surrounding a planter.

A cluster of Coots collected in a patch of floating leaves under the terrace of the Dell restaurant.

The Great Crested Grebes from the bridge nest were at the Vista. They are recognisable because the male still has the very worn remains of his breeding plumage but the female is in plain winter black and white.

Two Gadwall drakes and a female pulled up algae in the shallows at the edge of the Serpentine.

Two Shoveller drakes and a female were also feeding in their own way.