Colder means hungrier

A colder day made the small birds hungrier, and in the Rose Garden Blue Tits clustered in the bushes and perched on the camera when I was trying to photograph them.

A Coal Tit followed me across the lawn to the Dell, calling from a tree and flying down for pine nuts on the ground.

Another Blue Tit ...

... and Coal Tit were waiting impatiently in the corkscrew hazel in the Dell.

A Robin sang at Mount Gate. This is the female of the pair, singing only an occasional phrase: males sing more than females in spring though at other times it's about equal.

A male Blackbird looked for insects in the shrubbery beside the Henry Moore sculpture, and pulled up a worm on the lawn.

Someone had dropped an apple in the middle of the path by the Italian Garden, and a male Rose-Ringed Parakeet was hard at work on it, ignoring the people walking past on either side.

The Great Crested Grebes' nest on the chain at the west end of the island is in a perilous place. Last year the boat people destroyed a nest here by moving the boats, although they had been warned not to. They have been warned again this year, but whether they will take any notice remains to be seen. The good people of Bluebird Boats would have been most careful.

A couple of sunny days have raised algae at the east end of the Serpentine, providing shelter for fish and therefore a good place for a grebe to hunt them.

The Coot nest under the Dell restaurant balcony now has several menus in it.

The Mute Swan 4GIQ was on the nest basket again but didn't stay there long. She is by no means settled either here or by the landing stage, despite the efforts of the Black Swan ...

... who was on the shore preening his fine ruffles.

The swan nest on the island was empty, and the pair seemed to have moved up to the west end to start again. They had spent quite a lot of time piling up twigs for the first nest, so it seems likely that they will return.

In the reeds east of the Lido, 4FUF has laid her first egg. The pair were in the water nearby. She won't start incubating them till she has laid several more.

The Canada Goose pair are firmly established on the nesting island in the Long Water, untroubled by swans. The number of swans here has been whittled down to one pair by territorial disputes, and they are nesting on the gravel strip.

The six teenage Egyptians on the Serpentine are getting their wing feathers, but it will be some time before they attempt to fly.

The five goslings at the Lido were watchful and poised to flee as a loose dog approached.

A Gadwall drake on the edge of the Serpentine preened his wings and had a flap to settle the feathers.