Owl surprise

On a day with a sharp and chilly east wind it was a surprise to see the female Little Owl at the Queen's Temple looking out of her hole.

She didn't do anything much, just looked down for a moment and went back to dozing. It was near sunset, and she would have been waiting for the park to close so she could go hunting.

Nearby, a Song Thrush sang quietly to himself as he lurked in the twigs of a hawthorn tree near the Queen's Temple.

The male Robin at Mount Gate sang at dusk amid the traffic noise of the busy road. His mate, on the railings a few yards away, is less vocal but answered him occasionally.

The colder day brought out a lot of small birds in the Rose Garden, including a Great Tit in the blossom buds of a dogwood tree ...

... a Coal Tit ...

... and a Blue Tit in a rose bush ...

... and the familiar male Chaffinch in a hawthorn.

It was business as usual at the corkscrew hazel in the Dell, with the two Coal Tits ...

... and several Blue Tits ...

... dodging the jealous Robin.

The Robin at the southwestern corner of the bridge is also bossy about his tree, but the tits crowd round him anyway.

The pontoon people at the bridge are willing to remove a few sections from the end of their raft to allow the swans to pass, but the procedure has to go through their management and probably the Byzantine bureaucracy of the park manager before anything is done.

Meanwhile the boss swan's mate is still waiting sadly at the Vista ...

... while he pointlessly swims up and down the other side of the bridge.

The wind made for good flying weather and the big male 4GIS hauled himself into the air ...

... but the idea has simply not occurred to the boss, who has always gone under the bridge and is set in his ways. It's lucky that he didn't notice the Black Swan chasing some of his teenagers. 

(By the way, the pontoons blocking the bridge are on the other side. What you see here is a smaller raft that is moved around.)

Canada Geese grazing beside the Serpentine saw a loose dog approaching in the distance and moved in a dignified manner to the safety of the water.

The barriers around the Wasteland site are coming down at last, revealing a scene of devastation even worse than last year's. But nature is already beginning to heal the mess, helped by the very efficient Talbot turf company who will be moving in soon for another million-pound job. The daffodils confined under the ramp are green again, but they have been set back and won't be flowering for a couple of weeks.