A distant view of the Little Grebe

There has been a single Little Grebe on the Long Water for more than a week and I have heard it calling, but never managed to get a sight of it lurking under the bushes. Today there was a very distant view of it by a reed bed on the Long Water.

The posts where the ill-fated tern raft was moored are still sticking out of the water, and make a perch for Cormorants.

A lot of the Black-Headed Gulls on the Serpentine now have the dark heads of their breeding plumage and some have already left for their breeding grounds, which may be as far away as Finland or as local as Basildon though they never breed actually in the park. Their courtship rituals have intensified, and now the female is sitting down to indicate willingness to nest.

A pair of Gadwalls dabbled in dead leaves in the shallow water by the outflow, where you can look down on to them over the balustrade.

The single young Mute Swan hatched on the Serpentine last year was sitting alone on the nest site in the nearby reed bed where it first saw the light of day. But it still isn't associating with any of the other swans. Having been brought up by itself with very attentive parents, it's socially maladjusted.

The Egyptian family, still with six goslings, had moved up the shore to near the Lido.

Pigeon Eater was looking immaculate in the sunshine by the Dell restaurant, with his mate on the roof above him.

The familiar female Pied Wagtail hunted along the edge. She caught some small and unidentifiable creature.

The Little Owl at the Ranger's Cottage came out on a branch but was hard to see through the twigs.

A Jay looked down from a branch near the Queen's Temple, the frontal view displaying its Groucho Marx moustache.

The Robin at the southwest corner of the bridge came out to collect pine nuts ...

... as did a Great Tit in a camellia bush in the Flower Walk ...

... and a Blue Tit in the Wedge-Leaf Wattle in the Rose Garden.

Chiffchaffs were singing but not coming close enough for a photograph. This one was taken by Ahmet Amerikali in the scrub behind the Queen's Temple.

Starlings at the Lido restaurant were frustrated by an inverted plate when trying to take some leftover chips.

A Buff-Tailed Bumblebee worked over pussy willow catkins near the bridge.

Martenitsas are appearing in the trees. This is an Eastern European tradition, and most of them are put here by the Bulgarians who live around the embassy in Queen's Gate. The red and white yarn signifies a man and a woman, and on the first of March you give it usually to a girlfriend or boyfriend who must then hang it on the first blossoming tree as a symbol of fertility. Since spring has come very early this year, no one has had to wait long to hang up a martenitsa.

A pair of Grey Wagtails

There was only one Grey Wagtail in the park over the winter. It stayed here because it had been hatched near the bridge, in the Triangle shrubbery. Now two have turned up and are hunting midges over the water, which are plentiful now. Maybe they will nest in the same place.

Here is one of them with a midge.

A female Pied Wagtail used a post at the Vista as a hunting station.

The Little Owl at the Ranger's Cottage was in the same place as yesterday and the day before. The light was better, but it's still on the shaded side of the tree.

There are at least twenty Blue Tits in the Rose Garden. One perched in magnolia buds ...

... and another in the Wedge-Leaf Wattle by the gate.

A Great Tit waited in a pink-flowered cherry tree.

One of the Coal Tits at the bridge looked down from a holly twig. It takes some work to give it pine nuts, as it won't come to my hand and there are Feral Pigeons on the ground ready to grab anything dropped there. We manage somehow, but it would be helpful if it got a bit more confident.

Ahmet Amerikali photographed one of the Long-Tailed Tits carrying a feather dropped by Egyptian Goose. They find feathers all over the ground, but there may also be a dead bird in the bushes which they somehow manage to pluck with their tiny beaks.

A Robin posed grandly in the forsythia at Mount Gate.

Four Grey Herons squabbled over food at the Lido.

The young herons in the top nest on the island are restless and wanting to explore, but they aren't yet quite ready to venture far out of the nest. Even after they first come out they will return to be fed for some time until they are independent.

Pigeon Eater and his mate shouted at a Herring Gull that had invaded their place on the Dell restaurant roof. The gull refused to budge and shouted back.

It seems that washing, like preening, is infectious even across species. Egyptian Geese and a Carrion Crow were enjoying a splash on the Serpentine.

The Egyptians at Fisherman's Keep, despite constant vigilance, lost another gosling a couple of days ago and now have six. But these are growing fast and their chances of survival are increasing daily.

However, the ones at the Lido are all gone. It shows what a difference attentive parents make to the survival of young.

A pair of Pochards cruised past the Vista.

A Buff-Tailed Bumblebee browsed on a wallflower in the Rose Garden.

The flowers on the paperbushes at the corner of the Dell are beginning to wilt but there is still plenty of nectar for a Hairy-Footed Flower Bee.

Long-Tailed Tits' nest

A Long-Tailed Tits' nest by the leaf yard ...

... was a busy scene, with birds bringing feathers to line it ...

and pausing to preen.

Unfortunately the entrance is on the far side of the nest, so they can't be photographed going in or out.

A Robin was watching. It accepted some pine nuts.

This is probably its last year's nest, which would have been deep in the brambles but has been exposed by cutting them back.

The female Robin at Mount Gate was waiting to be fed. I don't know what she's eating in the last shot, not something I gave her.

Tom, Ahmet and I were trying to photograph the Cetti's Warbler at the Vista, which was occasionally visible but never in a place for a shot. However, here is a dramatic shot by Ahmet taken a couple of days ago when it was sunny.

A Wren hopped around in the undergrowth near the Henry Moore sculpture.

The Coal Tit pair in the Flower Walk followed me the whole way along, flying down to my hand for pine nuts whenever there was a gap in the stream of larger birds.

A Blue Tit was flitting around impatiently in the forsythia at Mount Gate.

Great Tits came out in the cherry blossom in the Rose Garden.

The Little Owl at the Ranger's Cottage looked down from the edge of his hole, though the light was so poor that it was impossible to get a picture to do him justice.

The male Peregrine was on the corner of the tower, not a place he usually goes. It gives him a view down two sides of the building in case an unwary Feral Pigeon should be passing below.

A Wood Pigeon was eating leaf buds in a tree beside the Serpentine. They are full of sweet sap and the birds are very keen on them, but don't eat enough to do much harm to the tree -- unlike Rose-Ringed Parakeets, a few of which can completely wreck it with their wasteful eating habits.

Parakeets were wandering around Buck Hill eating new dandelion leaves, and there was a Stock Dove among them which seemed to be doing the same, though the picture shows it holding a small white object.

A Cormorant caught a roach under the parapet of the Italian Garden.

A Grey Heron came in to land next to it, to the Cormorant's annoyance.

The Mandarin pair had come down from the Round Pond and could be seen at the Vista.

Owl on a dim day

On a chilly grey day it was a surprise to see the male Little Owl at the Ranger's Cottage out on the edge of his hole. This is on the shaded side of the tree and the dim light has reduced the colours in the picture almost to monochrome sepia.

There was a bit of colour at Mount Gate, where the local male Chaffinch perched in currant blossom ...

... and there was a Blue Tit in the forsythia.

Another Blue Tit perched on the Russian olive bush in the Rose Garden, undeterred by its ferocious spikes.

This bush, Elaeagnus angustifolia, is sometimes called 'oleaster', which is misleading as it is nothing to do with the unrelated true oleaster or wild olive, Olea oleaster, which was the source of the olive wreaths awarded to victors at the ancient Olympic Games.

A Coal Tit preferred a rose bush.

A Long-Tailed Tit near the Italian Garden turned round on a twig but its tail didn't, catching on a bud. The agile bird wasn't bothered by this, which must happen all the time.

A male Greenfinch perched in the top of an alder, a favourite tree with finches of all kinds which eat the seeds of its black fruits in winter when there aren't many insects.

A Jackdaw in a hawthorn below looked about to go supersonic.

A female Pied Wagtail was catching midges on the roof of the boat hire building. One sneaked past her.

A pair of Great Crested Grebes fished together under the edge of the platform. The male is on the left here, as you can see from his wider crest.

The second brood of two young Grey Herons on the island could be seen through myrobalan blossom. They are already almost fully grown, though it will be some time before they are independent.

The Black Swan chased off 4GIQ's Mute mate.

He has made a nest by the Diana fountain reed bed, and was trying to get her interested in it. She tolerates him but remains indifferent.

The undergrowth at the Triangle gave a pair of Mute Swans a selection of grasses and weeds to vary their diet.

The pair of Egyptian Geese from the Rose Garden were in the Dell, grazing under the big old pink magnolia tree.

The mothers at Fisherman's Keep ...

... and the Lido were sheltering their goslings, so it wasn't possible to count them.

A sadly thin and tatty fox with an injured hind leg limped across the path by the Henry Moore sculpture.