Lurking in the leaves

A Wren lurked shyly in a bush in the Flower Walk.

The Coal Tit in the Dell hates being photographed and also does its best to hide in the leaves. It seems almost unkind to photograph it, but it does get several pine nuts as a reward.

The two in the Flower Walk, both of which will come to my hand, are easier but you still need to be quick.

A Blue Tit is used to the camera and even seems to pose for its portrait ...

... as does the faithful Robin at Mount Gate.

Long-Tailed Tits are completely indifferent to humans (apart from a single bird in St James's Park which Mark Williams managed to lure to his hand with bits of suet).

A Jackdaw on the edge of the Serpentine stood in front of a Black-Headed Gull to make sure it got to the peanut first.

A pair of Black-Headed Gulls walked the walk and talked the talk on the edge of the Serpentine.

Feeding the Great Crested Grebe chicks at the east end of the Serpentine island was interrupted by a gull trying to grab the fish.

You would think that grebe chicks were permenently ravenous and would instantly swallow any fish that was offered, but this one on the Long Water was reluctant. Maybe even a chick can have enough sometimes.

Its father eventually ate the fish himself and headed off under the bridge.

Chicks are also given plenty of feathers to wrap up fishbones.

The four grebes which arrived in the middle of the swimming event on Saturday are still together. They seem to be two males and two females, so they should soon split into pairs and look for territories.

A Grey Heron waited beside a boathouse for a fish to venture out from under the concrete beams supporting the wall.

Another was doing the same on the other side.

A very faded Common Carder bee browsed on a gaudy lantana flower in the Rose Garden.

A Greenbottle fly wandered over a stonecrop flower.

A Hornet Hoverfly rested upside down on an ivy leaf behind the Lido, kept in place by the sticky hairs on its feet.