I was called to the bridge to see a pair of what were reported as Wood Warblers, which would be quite a find in the park. Warblers are difficult, and I'm not sure they were. Their pale legs seem to rule out Chiffchaffs, but the brightness of their yellow underparts is surprising. Here are two pictures. What do you think? Update: Likely to be a young Willow Warbler -- juveniles are yellower than adults.

It didn't help that there were other kinds of warblers looking for insects in the deserted Magpie nest in the tree. There were a Chiffchaff ...

... a Reed Warbler photographed by Ahmet Amerikali ...

... and a Goldcrest.

A Grey Heron looked down on the confusion from the top of the next tree.

The female Little Owl was in the chestnut tree 50 yards east of the nest tree which the pair seem to favour at the moment.

A Carrion Crow feasted on the fruit in a rowan at the top of Buck Hill.

There is a broken land drain on one side of the Vista. Repairs to the bottom end seem to have made the upper parts worse, and there is now a marsh in front of the Queen's Temple. Carrion Crows take advantage of it to look for insects.

A Robin sang loudly in the Rose Garden, competing with the noise of the rollerbladers' boom boxes on the road behind.

A Starling stared at the camera from the railings at the Lido restaurant.

A young Herring Gull and a Black-Headed Gull devoured what at first seemed to be chips, but in fact they were some kind of snack food extruded in a hollow square section in various colours.

There were a lot of Lesser Black-Backed Gulls on the Long Water, most of them young. When they flew you could see the all-dark wings that identified them.

The Moorhens in the Italian Garden still have three chicks. These scenes show all three and both parents.

The sunshine made rainbows in the fountains.

A Common Drone fly, Eristalis tenax, worked over the flowers of a Verbena bonariensis in the Rose Garden.

The trees at the southwest corner of the bridge are now the best place to see small birds. Today there were a Chiffchaff which had just caught an insect ...

... a young Goldcrest, part of a family flitting around in a hawthorn ...

... and a Robin on the dead tree.

There were also Great Tits, Blue Tits, Chaffinches and Greenfinches, which I didn't get a picture of on a dark grey day.

The abundant fruit in the rowan trees on Buck Hill attracted a Blackbird.

Hawthorn fruit grows on the ends of thin twigs, making it hard for a heavy Wood Pigeon to reach it. They often fall out of the tree.

A Magpie washed in the pool at the top of the Dell waterfall.

The young Grey Herons, still obstinately staying in the nest, practised an adult pair's greeting display.

A young Herring Gull played with a stick and a leaf, diving, picking them up and dropping them.

There's not enough meat in a crayfish claw to make it worth a gull's time in breaking it open, but it makes an amusing toy.

The Great Crested Grebes on the Long Water fed one of the chicks ...

... then allowed them out for a swim.

A Moorhen kept a chick warm beside the little stream in the Dell.

Another preened a chick in the Italian Garden, looking for fleas and lice to eat.

A Shoveller and a Pochard sat amicably side by side on the fallen poplar in the Long Water.

No patch of grass is too small for an Egyptian Goose to eat, no puddle too small to drink from.

Tom was at Rye Meads, where he got a good picture of a Muntjac deer.

A large group of Starlings enjoyed a splash at the Lido restaurant terrace.

A Chiffchaff perched on the dead tree near the bridge.

Long-Tailed Tits passed through the trees on the opposite shore.

Neil photographed a Nuthatch in a treetop in the Flower Walk. This bird is often heard in the area but always hard to get a picture of.

Neil also got a distant shot of two Hobbies high over Kensington Gardens, heading for the Round Pond.

But we couldn't find a Little Owl today.

A Grey Heron shooed another away, showing the threat posture with wings lowered. The way the loser raises one wing seems strange, as if it wanted to fend off a blow.

A heron in the Italian Garden hoped that a fish would come out from under a water lily leaf.

There was a very pale Herring Gull on the edge of the Serpentine, with odd grey eyes. Its wings had the usual black and white pattern and I don't think it was some exotic species.

The Great Crested Grebe chicks on the Long Water are still being carried.

This parent from the west end of the island seemed bored by its chick's incessant begging.

The other parent was getting much the same from the other chick.

The teenager from the other end of the island was preening.

The bullying male Mute Swan from the west end of the Serpentine was chasing the others around.

The Black Swan had a drink.

A Tufted Duck washed splashily.

The group of Red-Crested Pochards on the Long Water seem to be stuck there, as some are moulting their wing feathers.

A fox came down to the edge of the Long Water to drink and groom. It looked old and walked stiffly, and like most urban foxes was suffering from mange.

Another picture from Neil, of a fungus at the base of a beech tree near the Albert Memorial. As usual, I don't know what it is.

There is an outbreak of blue-green algae on the Serpentine, unusually as the last few days have been quite cool. Warm weather is expected and it may get worse. Bathing has been stopped because these algae are toxic as well as foul-smelling.

A Wren hopped around in a bush beside the Vista ...

... and a Chiffchaff sang a few phrases.

A Great Tit ate a pine nut she took from my hand.

Starlings milled around in the grass by the Diana memorial fountain. There is an ants' nest here, providing a tasty snack.

The male Little Owl appeared in the morning in a chestnut tree a short way east of the nest tree, where he has been seen before.

There was a Jay in the same tree, but it flew in from the far side and hadn't noticed the owl, or there would have been a lot of indignant squawking.

The female Peregrine was on the barracks. She raised a lethal foot to scratch herself.

A Black-Headed Gull from Poland stood on the gravel bank. Its yellow ring has the code TNX7. We have two regular Polish visitors, T4UN and T8YT, but I haven't seen this one before.

One of the Moorhens from the willow near the bridge fed a chick ...

... and then they went under the bridge and occupied a Coots' nest, defending it against the Coots trying to get it back.

More Shovellers have arrived on the Long Water.

The visiting Red-Crested Pochards seem to have settled in at the north end, where there are a lot of algae and water plants for them to browse on.

A rat strolled over the Serpentine island, dangerously close to a Grey Heron. It avoided being eaten.

A female Common Darter dragonfly landed on my head, then flew to the camouflage cover of a camera lens. It was oddly calm while several people took close-up pictures with their phones.

A Buff-Tailed Bumblebee was kept busy by the multiple florets of a patch of Sedum by the Dell.

A Buzzard swept over the Serpentine.

After it had gone, Tom and I noticed that the waterfowl were looking up nervously.

There were five more Buzzards high overhead, going up in a thermal and diving down.

There were also two Hobbies, too far up even for a bad picture. But a couple of days ago Andrew Fowkes found them -- I think these are the two young ones -- perched together in a plane tree near the Old Police House, and kindly sent this video.

All the videos in this blog post are in 4K. I hope this reduces the pixelation caused by YouTube's compression, even if you choose to view them in ordinary HD.

A Common Sandpiper flew down on to the gravel bank in the Long Water.

Tom photographed the female Little Owl in the nest tree.

I missed her, and she didn't come back.

Greenfinches flew into a larch tree near the bridge.

Starlings sang as they waited to raid a table at the Lido restaurant.

They are particularly fond of chips, and perch on the tables looking expectant.

I looked for the Grey Wagtail at the Dell pool, but it wasn't there. A Robin came down to drink on one side ...

... and a Carrion Crow on the other.

A pair of Cormorants performed a courtship display at the Serpentine island.

A young Herring Gull amused itself by ripping twigs out of the disused Coot nest on the post at Peter Pan. The Coots have long since raised their four chicks.

The young Grey Herons in the nest were excited by a parent landing in the top of the tree and made a racket in the hope of getting fed.

A Great Crested Grebe chick fished up a mysterious orange object from the bottom of the Serpentine. We thought it was a segment of orange, but it doesn't seem to be. Update: Tom thinks it might be a dried apricot.

The chick was in a playful mood, and shortly afterwards started picking up leaves.

A Willow Emerald damselfly perched on a twig near the Little Owls' tree.