Monday 24 August 2015

The young Lesser Black-Backed Gull at the Dell restaurant was again begging for food from the adult male pigeon-eating gull, who may or may not be its father.


But later, when the adult pair found a dead carp to share, they didn't invite the young one.


A Great Crested Grebe was working its way along the edge of the Serpentine, looking for small fish in the shallows. There is not enough depth of water to dive properly, so when it finds one it has to use a splashy shallow diving technique.


A Grey Heron was preening on one of the baskets around the island.


These baskets of water plants have never done very well. As soon as a plant emerges from the wire mesh, a Coot eats it. So the baskets remain a bit of an eyesore. In contrast, the floating rafts at the east end of the lake are covered with luxuriant growth and will look almost natural when the plants have had time to spread out more horizontally.

The Robin at the Lido, whose territory lies around aome small olive trees, has reclaimed it for the winter and is singing to defend it.


The Magpie family near the Henry Moore sculpture were peacefully looking for insects in the grass until a passing Carrion Crow thought it would be fun to chase them.


One of the Little owlets was in the nest tree, looking at me intently. It still finds photographers interesting, unlike its father, who no longer deigns to notice them.


Several Mistle Thrushes were hard at work eating berries in the rowan trees on Buck Hill.


A few yards away, a patch of  Horse Mushrooms has come up.

9 comments:

  1. There is a handsome fungus, the Giant Polypore (Meripilus giganteus), on top of Buck Hill, if you are interested in taking a photo. It is on the ground under a hazelnut bush in the edge of W. Carriage Drive. You need to go NE from the Buckhill playground toward the bend of W Carriage Drive (opposite the traffic island). It's quite large, you can't miss it.
    Mario

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    1. Thanks -- will go and look at it tomorrow. The bad weather should keep people away. As you will have guessed from my picture of the Silky Rosegill your alerted me to a few days ago, this had been smashed and I had to prop up the more intact bits in a lifelike attitude.

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  2. To be precise, they are not Field Mushrooms (Agaricus campestris), but their larger close relatives the Horse Mushroms (Agaricus arvensis). If you bruise or cut them, they smell of almond/marzipan/anise).
    Mario

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    1. Thanks -- text changed. But I'm surprised. They were all quite small, including the fully developed one in the picture.

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    2. You are right to use the past tense, because they are no more. I had them with polenta this very evening. Mario

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    3. Well done. I didn't pick the ones I found because they were small and few. But I remember when I was small, in Dorset, picking bagfuls of horse mushrooms the size of plates, and they were delicious, with a stronger flavour than field mushrooms.

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    4. Mushrooms:
      You have another chance to photograph the Silky Rosegill, because further up the same tree, at the height of around two meters, there have been few more "eggs" which have been dormant for a while, but now one has started to "hatch". I would give it few more days before you have the mushroom in all its glory.
      Also, in Hyde Park, past the Serpentine bridge, as you go up toward Lancaster Gate along the W. Carriage Drive, just past the Sackler Gallery and the hidden building next to it, on the right side of the road there is a large, heavily pruned poplar (on the roots of which grows the Poplar Field cap). Before it, there is a not too big horse chestnut. Around it grows another photogenic mushroom, the Lawyer's Wig (Coprinus comatus). There are few individuals coming up, but again you have to give them a few days before they are at their best.
      Mario

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  3. There is also a multi-tiered Chicken-of-the-woods (Laetiporus sulphureus) on the dead tree trunk next to the Speke obelisk.
    Mario

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    1. Many thanks. I've photographed the developing Silky Rosegill and will keep an eye on it. It's probably high enough to escape being smashed. The night's rain has brought up the Lawyer's Wigs well -- picture on Monday'sblog -- and also some fairy rings on the Vista near the Little Owl tree. Will look at the Chicken of the Woods tomorrow.

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