The new Grey Heron chicks in the east end of the island were standing up, and you can just see that there are three of them.
A Herring Gull ...
... and a Lesser Black-Back by the Round Pond were vying for the remains of a Feral Pigeon. You can see that not much is left, so it looks as if this is one of Pigeon Eater's leftovers snatched from the edge of the Serpentine.
Pigeon Eater was at his usual station washing his face, as he always does after a bloody breakfast.
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A hungry young Carrion Crow by the bridge wouldn't let its parent have a moment's peace.
Crows are no respecters of royalty, or anyone else.
A Jackdaw waited patiently on a branch for me to finish photographing and give it a peanut.
Ahmet Amerikali got a good picture of a young Goldcrest in the Dell.
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A young Starling looking for insects in a pot of stonecrop at the Lido restaurant eyed a Honeybee flying overhead.
The six new Coot chicks in the Italian Garden fountain were passed by three teenagers from the other family. One rteurned and gave a chick a bad-tempered peck.
The six Mute cygnets were on the Long Water with their mother. One of them flapped its tiny wings. Swans' wings develop slowly, and they can't fly till some time after they have grown to full size. This is just as well, as they are clumsy in the air and any juvenile exploration would probably end in a crash.
The smallest Mandarin duckling on the Round Pond had wandered off as usual and was standing on the edge while its mother hurried to catch up with it.
The Mallard family were taking it easy.
Duncan Campbell got a remarkable video. A Common Wasp scrapes off fragments of wood, mixes them with saliva, and rolls them into a ball which it will carry off to add to its nest. Their neatly made and durable papier-mâché nests can be a foot across or more.
A patch of Woolly Yarrow in the Rose Garden attracted a Colletes bee of unknown species, of which there are a lot all over the garden.
It was joined by a Batman Hoverfly.
Tom was at Abberton reservoir near Colchester, where he found two spectacular butterflies, a Purple Hairstreak ...
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... and a Purple Emperor.
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I wouldn't know where to begin with butterflies, but those two are really beautiful.
ReplyDeleteWhy would the teen Coot go to the trouble of returning to peck at the poor chick. It serves no purpose.
Always shocking to see those teeny tiny chicken wings on what will be the massive hulk of an adult swan.
Tinúviel
Sometimes being pointlessly aggressive, stupid and stubborn is the key to success. The Coot population of the park has been steadily increasing since they arrived in the 1920s., so they must have been doing something right.
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