Regent’s Park:
Common Shelduck: 2m plus 1f on the main lake near area 8 at 9.20am.
Common Shoveler: pair near area 8.
Common Buzzard: one flew north at 1.55pm.
Lesser Black-backed Gull, intermedius race, though it looked as black as a Baltic Gull and stood out like a soar thumb.
Blackcap: 11 males singing from most suitable areas of the park.
Chiffchaff: 8 males singing.
Willow Warbler: 2 birds singing; one in area 9 and the other in area 33.
At least 2 chicks in the Herons nest opposite the Bandstand
LBB Gull Intermedius race, ?Baltic Gull, a very striking individual.
Chiffchaff in the Cricket Pen, area 31.
2 of three males singing in The Leaf Yard Wood, area 41.
Comments
Common Snipe 1 (flushed from grass tussocks at 07.15, close to the gorse bush in area 34 nearest the football pitch). Area 34 is not visited by Fright Jacket & Co; nevertheless, a curious retriever followed my scent to the same location not two minutes after I had passed! One minute after that, the snipe circled back overhead - I hope for safety's sake it made a 'lucky dip' into the fenced-off Cricket Pen (area 32). I returned to area 34 an hour later and found the tiny patch of exposed dark earth, the consistency of sawdust, that it had been probing. (A lifer for me, now that Wilson's Snipe of the New World is no longer considered to be a subspecies of this one.)
Reed Bunting 1f: area 2 at 08.15. (I had popped down to the lakeside, now that the green plastic fencing has been removed, curious to see how the preparations for the extended reed bed had turned out. Swimmingly, in fact: a female Reed Bunting was giving a plaintive, downward-slurring anxiety call, 'tseew', from the top of a willow tree next to the fenced-off area. She's behaving possessively, which is a good sign!)
Chiffchaff 7: areas 1, 14, 17, 19 (a pair together, with the male singing from an exposed perch), 31->32, and 40.
(I listened in vain for singing Willow Warblers.)
Blackcap 6: areas 14, 17, 31->30, and 40 (three singing males fighting along the NW fence boundary of the Leaf Yard Wood).
Gadwall 1m: area 36.
Shelduck 3 (pr area 1; free-flying m area 36.)
The open-water pair of shelducks (m free-flying, f winged) were feuding with the collection pair of the area 1 waterfowl sanctuary by billing each other through the bars of the iron grating, quacking and cackling, and with the sanctuary male displaying by extending his neck to lay his bill along the surface of the water.
Likewise at the Long Bridge sanctuary boundary in area 35, there were six Little Grebes - three on either side of the iron grating - whinnying at each other at close quarters for at least half an hour.
Six Mallard ducklings (plus one duck accompanied by three drakes) were underneath Long Bridge, area 35.
Male Kestrel, carrying what looked like a small snake, flew SE over Cricket Squares (area 37) at 07.25 towards nest site in Wetland Pen (area 32).
Black-headed Gull 1 (summer adult): area 8/9 (lake fenceposts).
Forsythia starting to drop blossoms.