Nice surprise!

During a break at the allotment this afternoon, I went to check the 'Nature area'. I was initially looking for Blackcaps, but this up in a tree was a very nice surprise instead:

I had been looking for some elsewhere in the park without luck so far, in relatively quieter parts, by the Thames, but this is so close to one of West London's busiest roads, Fulham Palace Road, it surprised me.
A pity the light was terrible and the angles difficult...

A gull with a bone to pick

At the supermarket yesterday I was taking photos of a Common Gull hoping to read its metal ring (unfortunately it was presenting the closure part) when I noticed the Herring Gull YW3T from last week.

I then noticed a Common Gull had found itself a (chicken?) bone to nibble on but it turned out I wasn't the only one to have noticed:

Where is my bone?

A pair of Greylags followed by 3 others flying over the Thames were the surprise visitors at the supermarket yesterday, as well as a pair of Coots, which I rarely see there.
Numbers of Black-headed Gulls have continued to dwindle with only 70 of them on the wharf at high tide and I am looking forward to concentrate my attention to these little guys once they're gone:

They've started being very active and vocal again. One male was calling under the eaves of one of the apartment blocks, a new site for this year as far as I am aware.

2 for the price of 1

Like I do every week when I go to the supermarket, especially at high tide, I checked for rings on gulls' legs. In particular, I was hoping to see the semi-regular one, white A6LK, which I had last seen on 8th December. And bingo! at the end of the scan, when I thought all hope was gone, there it was:

I proceeded to take a few more photos, including this one. I am not entirely sure what is so attractive about this bush but a few gulls went and ate a few leaves off it.

Then on the panel with a few others (there was an exceptionally high number of them that day):

If you look closely at the one ready to land, you can glimpse an orange ring, and there it is, obvious once the bird had landed.

For once, the ring was very easy to read: YW3.T. I got the info back overnight: this Herring Gull was ringed at Pitsea Landfill site in November and mine was the first reading since. Map here.

Is that profile good for you?

I'm hoping that, like A6LK, it'll stick around and I can follow its progress from time to time.