Country diary: swans throw their weight among feeding birds

Hyde Park, London: the heart of the city is an unlikely hub of eager mallards, pushy swans, waddling Canada geese and other wildfowlAlthough I’m in the heart of London, there are birds here in Hyde Park that remind me of my Northumberland home. I can hear the rattle of a jay and the scornful laugh of a green woodpecker, and watch a grey wagtail bob-bobbing along the edge of the Serpentine as they do along the banks of the East Allen. A dunnock forages beneath a shrub and a treecreeper nimb