Clumsy Wood Pigeon

A Wood Pigeon lurched around in the big Chinese privet tree at the bridge trying to reach the berries and, as usual, fell out.

A pair of Jays intercepted me on the way up the hill to the Round Pond ...

... where, despite the frosty temperature, the Little Owl was out enjoying the sunshine. She had chosen a different tree, the horse chestnut to the east of her nest tree.

A Jackdaw perched on the nest tree.

Ahmet Amerikali found a male Great Spotted Woodpecker in the woodland by the Henry Moore sculpture. We used to have a pair nesting here, but their tree collapsed and I don't know where they've settled.

The Robin beside the path came down for some pine nuts on the ground.

On the other side of the bridge two Robins were chasing each other through the trees in a territorial dispute.

A fine picture by Tom of a Long-Tailed Tit with a larva.

A Grey Heron stood imposingly on the roof of one of the small boathouses.

Pigeon Eater was doing the rounds chasing Herring Gulls off his patch ...

... but while he was away from his place on the Dell restaurant roof one of the rival Lesser Black-Backs, the one with dark eyes, had taken it and would have to be chased off too. The price of being Top Gull is constant vigilance.

Ahmet got another good picture of a Cormorant catching a perch under the Italian Garden. There are still fair-sized fish to be had but the stock is much depleted and the number of Cormorants on the lake is falling.

By the time I arrived it was flying away.

Two late-hatched young Moorhens, still in their drab teenage brown, were still hanging around with one of their parents. As usual with the secretive birds I never saw a nest or the young chicks.

The Wigeon was still at the Round Pond quietly grazing on the lawn. She stretched her wings.

The pair of Egyptian Geese that often stand on the Huntress fountain in the Rose Garden exchanged loud calls as they agreed to fly off.

Snowdrops have come out at the east end of the lake. However, I don't think they are the wild winter type Galanthus nivalis. They may be be the autumn-flowering species from the Mediterranean, G. reginae-olgae, named after Olga Constantinovna of Russia who was Queen of Greece in the late 19th century.

The gardeners call this scrubby patch the Caroline enclosure because there is a monument to Queen Caroline, wife of George II, for whom the Serpentine was created between 1727 and 1731. She too was an imported queen, from the royal house of Brandenburg-Ansbach. It was not an arranged marriage and George, who of course was German himself, was devoted to her. When she was on her deathbed in 1737 she entreated George to marry again. The heartbroken king cried, 'Non, non, j'aurai des maîtresses!' (He was the last English king unable to speak English, and French was the court language.)