The Peregrine returns

The Peregrines haven't been seen much since the male found a new mate after losing his original one last year. But today the male was on the barracks alone. All recent sightings have been of just one. Let's hope this doesn't mean that she's dumped him.

A Blue Tit in the Rose Garden got pushed off its twig by a larger Great Tit.

One of the Coal Tits here came to my hand for the first time. Encouraged by its success, it came back twice.

This Robin is now a confident feeder.

So is the one in the Flower Walk that lives in the yew hedge near the Albert Memorial.

But the next one along, in the corkscrew hazel bush, remains shy. It has got to the stage of picking up pine nuts from the ground, and flew down to collect some.

A Jay near the Round Pond was impatient at being photographed before it got its peanut.

At the southeast corner of the bridge there are two bushes next to each other, a cotoneaster with pretty red berries and a mahonia which has just come into flower, much later that the ones in the Rose Garden which are now over. I've always wanted to photograph a bird with the berries, but they never place themselves ideally and this shot of a Great Tit was the best I could manage.

There was a single Buff-Tailed Bumblebee in the mahonia, but this too refused to get into a good place for a picture.

The Grey Heron in the upper nest on the island was fussing around in the nest again, but there was still no sight of a chick.

The one in the east nest was still sitting. It's hard to tell what's happening here, but increasingly it's looking like a failure.

The Black-Headed Gull at the landing stage had seen off all intruders and was standing smugly on the edge.

I think the worm dance was invented by Herring Gulls, but the other gulls have copied it, even the small Black-Headed Gulls which are too light to patter strongly. Nevertheless it worked for this one at the Round Pond, which brought up a worm at 20 seconds into the video.

There was a strong wind, particularly at the exposed pond. A Black-Headed Gull bounced in the choppy waves. Luckily they don't get seasick.

A pair of Shovellers preened on the gravel strip. Most of the Shovellers that arrived in the autumn have now left, as the park is only a stop on their migration south.

The Mallard drake in the Dell had reclaimed the rock in the stream from the Moorhens.

The rock is now filthy and needs a good flood to raise the water level and wash it. But we shan't be having one for some time, as the upper waterfall is in need of rebuilding -- it was made about 140 years ago. Work will begin next month and will take some time, as it's a big job.

The boat hire had shut down because of the wind, and a Cormorant claimed the platform.

There are still several Cormorants left, and half a dozen were standing on the posts at Peter Pan. But they aren't catching much now.