Surprising news surfaced via the Birdwatch office (read Dominic Mitchell's blog) and the London Birders yahoo email group on 11 January that two Bearded Tits (or Bearded Reedlings, Panurus biarmicus) had been seen in Hyde Park one month previous. Alan Gibson had reported them in a tiny reedbed on the Serpentine lake, right next to a busy path at the Diana, Princess of Wales Memorial Fountain (between the Isis statue and the Lido). Park regular Ralph Hancock was sure he had heard them the previous day so Des McKenzie was on site at dawn the next morning and quickly located them.
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| Bearded Tit (Panurus biarmicus), Hyde Park, London, 13/01/13 |
This was the first record for both Hyde Park and the Inner London recording area and throughout Friday many local birders nipped to the park in their lunch breaks to see them feeding away on the Phragmites, right beside the path, and just over one kilometre away from Oxford Street!
I spent about 10 hours standing in the cold attempting to get some nice images over the weekend. Finally on Sunday afternoon the sun appeared and the birds performed very well. All previous images in the overcast and windy conditions of Saturday were forgotten. Hundreds of people stopped to glimpse them over the weekend - but most were not birders. Passing tourists and park regulars formed the bulk of the admirers, following their initial curiosity at the huddle of watchers and optics.
Both these females are ringed and some detective work by various London birders and photographers has enabled a complete numerical sequence to be read and then traced by the BTO. Details have now been published on the BTO ringing 'Demog Blog' revealing that they were ringed in November 2012 at Rye Meads in Hertfordshire.
One thing that struck me is how habitat creation of even the smallest reedbed really is worthwhile!
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| Photographing Inner London's first Bearded Tits (not posed by a model) |
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| This image shows just how close the birds were to a path used by hundreds |
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