The importance of hawthorns

The Robin at Mount Gate called for attention ...

... and so did another regular by the Henry Moore sculpture, in a hawthorn with autumn colours.

The one in the Rose Garden was also in a hawthorn, a tree much liked by small birds and which must have more than the usual number of insects.

A Coal Tit waited on the next branch before following me around the garden, as Coal Tits often do.

The two Coal Tits in the Dell were bouncing around in the yew tree.

The male Chaffinch was in the corkscrew hazel, another favoured place for small birds.

The holly at the bridge was full of Great Tits.

Long-Tailed Tits were going down the Flower Walk.

The Grey Wagtail -- apparently the only one in the park at the moment -- was at the Lido restaurant.

There are a lot of black and white Feral Pigeons in the park, each with an individual pattern.  The variety of pigeon colours is the result of pigeon fanciers' selective breeding for picturesque mutations. Species that haven't been treated in this way, such as Stock Doves and Wood Pigeons, are almost all the same colour.

The dominant Black-Headed Gull from the landing stage was at his other station, the head of the Big Bird statue, with a background of red cercis leaves.

The Common Gull at the Lido, still the only one to arrive, watched a Mute Swan go by.

A very pale young Cormorant stood on the boathouse roof. The number of Cormorants is now going down quickly, and they must have almost exhausted the supply of medium-sized fish in the lake earlier than they usually do.

Probably for this reason, the Great Crested Grebes are now often seen at the edge catching the smaller fish that cluster here.

Young grebes, and even adults, enjoy diving under Coots and surfacing right beside them to annoy them.

A Common Carder bee was hard at work gathering pollen on a clump of bog sage by the Diana fountain.

Ink Cap mushrooms have appeared in the scrub east of the Lido.