Friday 27 March 2015

The Moorhen occupying the old Coot nest in the small boathouse is now definitely nesting. Here she is with her mate.


Melissa the Carrion Crow also seems to be planning a nest, as she turned up in the Italian Garden holding a bunch of dog hair in her feet.


This is bad news for their son Kevin, who has been with his parents since he was hatched last year and is now about to be thrown out so that Charlie and Melissa can get on with their new brood. (Actually Kevin may be female. We have no way of knowing.)

The Mute Swans' nest island on the Long Water had a pair of Cormorants on it. This didn't seem to bother the swans; the two species have completely different interests.


The Scaup took a short walk on the island. Being a diving duck with his feet set far back, he is not an elegant walker, making even a Mallard look graceful in comparison. Although he now looks completely adult when swimming, he still has a few juvenile brown feathers on his underside.


Near the Lido, a Great Crested Grebe had been preening and was having a flap to settle its feathers. Grebes have narrow wings for their size, and hence a very high stalling speed, which explains the desperate effort they have to make to get into the air.


At the leaf yard, a male Ring-Necked Parakeet who had been given a peanut was the subject of envious attention from two females.


Nearby, this Treecreeper was running along the underside of a branch of an oak tree next to the chestnut tree where the Little Owls nested when they first came to the park. The chestnut tree has had a Treecreeper nest in it before, and may again.


In the next chestnut tree up the hill, the male Little Owl looked out of his hole for a brief two seconds and went back inside.


The male Tawny Owl has been heard several times this week, and glimpsed at dusk, a couple of hundred yards to the west of his nest tree -- that is, towards the Round Pond. The parents may well have taken their owlets west rather than south. But a daytime search of the area hasn't turned them up so far.

2 comments:

  1. Ralph
    tomorrow there will be the yearly LNHS walk in the park. If you are interested...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Have already arranged to be there, so you will have to put up with me lurching around blethering at you.

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