The grebes at the restaurant have eggs

The Great Crested Grebes who stole the Coots' nest under the balcony of the Dell restaurant now have eggs. You can't see them from this low angle, but the female on the nest is clearly turning them over to keep them evenly warmed.

The Coots who owned the nest and have two chicks are just having to do without.

A pair of Coots nested in an audaciously exposed position on the gravel strip on the Round Pond, where a Herring Gull could stroll up and grab a chick any time it felt hungry. Somehow they've got away with their gamble, but only just as they have one surviving chick.

Mandarin ducklings are very independent and at an early age wander off by themselves. I found four in various parts of the Round Pond. There may have been more.

It was the same on the Serpentine, where one of the two teenagers was resting in the shade of a lifebelt at Fisherman's Keep while the other was with its mother by the bridge.

The single Pochard duckling could be seen across the Vista with its mother.

The Black Swan with his Mute mate 4GIQ were with their cygnet by the bridge, as usual attracting an admiring crowd. They are now a celebrity couple.

The other swan family were at the Dell restaurant terrace, working the tables.

Pigeon Eater was also here, standing on a table. There were Feral Pigeons picking up scraps on the ground and he was clearly working out a way of pouncing on one from above in the narrow space between the benches. He had already killed one today, as I found the remains earlier in Kensington Gardens, probably carried off by a Carrion Crow.

The first Black-Headed Gulls have returned to the Round Pond.

The Greylag Goose U318 and mate were at the Triangle with 14 teenagers hatched outside the park and brought in as soon as they could fly. They can't have had all those by themselves, and probably some of them belong to U410 who has also brought in a family. But it's unusual for Greylags to look after each other's goslings -- unlike Canadas which do this routinely.

A pair of Egyptians at the Round Pond have eight young, now fairly grown up.

Egyptians tend to moult at odd times, not in unison like the larger geese. This one on the Serpentine has started early and is now regrowing its primaries.

The three Grey Heron chicks in the nest at the east end of the island were restless, wandering about and flapping. They will soon be out of the nest and exploring the trees.

The male Little Owl at the Serpentine Gallery stared down from the plane tree...

... and his daughter was in the chestnut.

Theodore found a feather from an adult under the trees.

I looked for Red-Eyed Damselflies in the Italian Garden and found a few in the northeast pool.

This bright fungus on a half-dead cherry tree by Temple Gate is a Shaggy Bracket, Inonotus hispidus.

Angry Mistle Thrushes

Mistle Thrushes near the Albert Memorial rattled angrily at a Magpie perched above in a  plane tree. They've been very scarce this year while Song Thrushes have been abundant.

The female Little owlet looked out of a plane tree.

Her father was in a lime.

A Jay in the chestnut where the owls nested was clearly feeling the heat.

A Great Tit at Mount Gate was threadbare from feeding chicks.

A Grey Heron in the Dell looked at the fin of a carp breaking the surface -- too large to catch but there are plenty of smaller ones for them.

Tom got a dramatic shot of a heron in the Italian Garden jumping into a pool to get a carp. Usually they can reach from the kerb, but this fish must have been too far out. The heron considered it worth the trouble of having to swim to somewhere it could put its feet down, something that herons can do but not well.

The Great Crested Grebes at the Dell restaurant are still holding on to the stolen Coot nest.

The Coots in the northwest pool of the Italian Garden fountains were looking after their five chicks, still only a few days old.

The nest that the Coots built in the middle of the Long Water wasn't properly attached. It came adrift and drifted up the lake. They have abandoned it.

The Black Swan was more interested in getting some sunflower hearts than in his mate and cygnet, and came hurrying over ...

...leaving them in the middle of the Serpentine.

The Greylag Goose U410 and mate have flown in with six teenagers hatched in a safer place outside the park. This is common behaviour now among the big geese. Intelligent birds.

The six Egyptian goslings by the boathouses are growing well.

A pair of Egyptians rested on the fallen poplar at Peter Pan. Although it is dead a profusion of other plants has come up on the rotten wood.

There are five Red-Crested Pochard drakes on the Long Water and one on the Serpentine, but no females. The one preening on the right here is still in his smart breeding plumage, but the other is going into eclipse and looking quite tatty. Soon he will have the same plain light brown plumage as a female, though his red bill will show that he's male.

The Common Pochards used to be extremely shy, but now that we have a permanent ppulation they are adapting to park life and have got quite calm around humans. One sat in the middle of the path at the Triangle and made people walk round him.

This large and handsome bracket fungus on a tree across the road from the Serpentine Gallery is a Dryad's Saddle, Cerioporus squamosus.

A full house of Little Owls

The whole Little Owl family at the Serpentine Gallery was on view today, with the two owlets together in the chestnut tree ...

... their father keeping an eye on them from a lime ...

... and their mother in a more distant lime. I had to go back later to find her.

A male Blackbird was singing out of sight in the leaf yard, and a young one was on a lower branch listening to him.

On a hot afternoon the small birds were keeping out of sight in the shade, but Ahmet Amerikali continues to get good pictures of the Reed Warblers at the Italian Garden.

He also photographed a Cormorant catching a carp in one of the pools.

Yesterday we saw a Grey Heron catching carp here. In both cases they were going for fair-sized fish, but the water is teeming with young carp a couple of inches long.

A heron sunbathed in a boat at the island.

The Great Crested Grebes here have had very bad luck with nesting. The pair halfway along the island have lost their second nest to a Mallard, and the ones nesting on the chain lost theirs some time ago.

However, the pair under the balcony of the Dell restaurant are still keeping the nest they stole from the Coots.

These are the Coots in the southeast pool in the Italian Garden. When a parent starts preening, the chicks in the nest follow suit.

The solitary tatty Black-Headed Gull was feeling the heat. Its companions will start to trickle back quite soon.

The Black Swan was on the Serpentine taking care of his single hybrid cygnet while his Mute mate 4GIQ went off to have a wash.

A Gadwall drake goimg into eclipse rested in the shade at the Triangle.

A Painted Lady butterfly drank nectar from a Verbena bonariensis in the Flower Walk.

A female Emperor dragonfly was laying eggs on a fallen iris leaf in the Italian Garden ...

... and a male rested on an upright leaf.

After the very brief and scanty showing of Red-Eyed Damselflies in the pools I was wondering how the Small Red-Eyed Damselflies, which come later, would fare. There were quite a few today.

An unexpected Cockatoo

One of the two Little owlets at the Serpentine Gallery looked around from a chestnut branch. It seems as if this one is male, as he already has substantial eyebrows. Previous pictures have shown a female.

Their mother was in the lime tree 50 yards away.

Their father could be heard, but not seen, in a plane tree. I heard him calling a warning when a Sparrowhawk passed overhead. Lower in the same tree two Jays were angling for peanuts.

Nearby at Mount Gate a Carrion Crow was being remorselessly pestered by its two offspring.

The female Robin also appeared here, looking sadly threadbare.

Ahmet Amerikali was in the Italian Garden photographing a Reed Warbler ...

... when a white Cockatoo flew down to take a drink in the fountains. It visited twice and is likely to be seen again here. I haven't seen or heard anything from an owner trying to recover an escaped pet.

Update: I'm told that this is a Cockatiel, though that is a member of the cockatoo family.

The local Grey Heron was catching carp in the pools.

Five minutes after taking that one it got another, but carelessly dropped it.

Perhaps surprisingly, the Great Grested Grebes have kept possession of the stolen Coot nest at the Dell restaurant.

Now that the Black Swan has given up his vigil on the nest raft, the stubborn Coots are in sole possession.

The swan family was together on the other side of the lake.

The Mandarin with her two ducklings, now teenagers, passed by. The second young one was lagging and I couldn't get them all in the picture.

A female Black-Tailed Skimmer dragonfly rested on acanthus flowers in the Dell.

Females are much less common than males, but there was another on the railings at Mount Gate.

A male Emperor perched on purple loosestrife in the Italian Garden ...

... and a Painted Lady butterfly flitted around the vervain which has sprung up all round the pools.

A male Common Blue Damselfly was in a patch of marsh marigolds at the back of the Dell.