Two weeks ago I had the opportunity to take a very nice, if very wet, trip to London. Because of the terrible weather I wasn’t able to do too much birding, but I did manage to spend a morning watching parenting of all kinds in the Wandsworth Common. I only photographed the avian parents, but all the while  a number of humans were engaged in pretty similar activities behind me.

This mallard mother was mad at the coot for getting too close to her ducklings. The coot was trying to get the best pond slime for its own children, and wasn’t too happy to be pushed around by the mallard. They made a big fuss about the whole thing.

This is what an angry coot looks like. I don’t think the mallard was too impressed.