More grebe news

More good news from the Great Crested Grebes: Jon Ferguson saw a parent near the boathouse with two chicks. His picture shows one of them. This is the pair that nested halfway along the island, hatched chicks, and disappeared for several days so that we were worried about them.

The nest under the Dell restaurant balcony also has two chicks, which can be indistinctly seen here under the parent's right wing.

But there are also three unhatched eggs. It's not clear yet whether any of these will hatch.

One of the three chicks at the east end of the island took a small fish.

At the nest under the willow the sitting grebe's mate is constantly hanging around, which is probably a sign that the eggs are about to hatch.

Two very small Coot chicks have appeared from a nest in the bushes east of the Lido.

A Mute Swan on the Serpentine had a vigorous washing session and finished it off with a powerful flap.

An Egyptian Goose was also making a splash.

There are two black (or at least very dark brown) and white Mallard drakes. One was at the Dell restaurant where I saw it earlier ...

... and the other was on the willow by the bridge.

We have had dark Mallards on the lake for years but these two are definitely darker. Quite likely they are siblings.

You could tell that Pigeon Eater wasn't on his territory, as a pack of Herring Gulls was right in the middle of it squabbling about a bit of food.

Pigeon Eater was visiting the Long Water. He stood on a post at Peter Pan while his offspring alternately whined at him and played with a twig.

Most of the Robins are singing tentatively now, but this one on the edge of the Flower Walk was in full song.

A Wren could be glimpsed jumping around in the trees by the bridge.

Behind the Queen's Temple, a Speckled Wood butterfly on a leaf gave a head-on view. You can only see one of its eyes because its upturned proboscis hides the other.

In the next tree there was a female Common Blue damselfly. Females vary in colour and this was a green one.

There is a clump of exotic trees between the Dell and the Rose Garden. This is a Goldenrain tree, Koelreuteria paniculata, an East Asian species, now covered with papery fruit.