Misty, mizzling, dewy rain begins the fall. Do not the sparrows now begin to feed on seeds of weeds in gardens?

September 1.

A misty morning followed by a still, cloudy, misty day, through which has fallen a very little rain this forenoon already. 

Now I notice a few faint-chipping sparrows, busily picking the seeds of weeds in the garden. Are they the Savannah sparrows? They show no white in tail. Yet I see no yellow on brows. Small feathers on back, centred with black and edged with pale brown (?); inner vanes of wing -quills bay; crown without chestnut; brown dash from angle of mouth backward. Do not the sparrows now commonly begin to feed on seeds of weeds in gardens? 

P. M. — Along river to E. Hosmer’s. A very little mizzling. 

The Aster Tradescanti is perhaps beginning to whiten the shores on moist banks. 

I see a fine (reddish) topped grass in low lands, whitened like a thin veil with what it has caught of this dewy rain. It wets my feet much. 

The Cornus sericea berries are now in prime, of different shades of blue, lighter or darker, and bluish white. They are so abundant as to be a great ornament to our causeways and riverside. The white berried, too, is now in prime. The Viburnum dentatum berries are smaller and duller. The Viburnum Lentago are just fairly begun to have purple cheeks. 

Even this rain or mizzling brings down many leaves of elms and willows, etc.,—the first, to notice, since the fall of the birches which began so long ago.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 1, 1854

A misty morning followed by a still, cloudy, misty day. See September 2, 1854 ("The second still, misty, mizzling and rainy day . . . The moderate mizzling rain of yesterday and to-day is the first since that moderate one of August 4th. Yet this brings down leaves, cools the rivers and ponds, and brings back ducks and other migratory birds."); September 10, 1854 ("The still, cloudy, mizzling days, September 1st and 2d, the thunder-shower of evening of September 6th, and this regular storm are the first fall rains after the long drought.")

Now I notice a few faint-chipping sparrows, busily picking the seeds of weeds in the garden. See See August 25, 1859 ("Quite a flock of (apparently) Fringilla socialis in the garden"); September 16, 1854 (“I see little flocks of chip-birds along the roadside and on the apple trees, showing their light under sides when they rise.”); September 17, 1858 (“Methinks, too, that there are more sparrows in flocks now about in garden”);   September 27, 1858 ("What are those little birds in flocks in the garden and on the peach trees these mornings, about size of chip-birds, without distinct chestnut crowns?”); October 5, 1858 (" I still see large flocks, apparently of chip birds, on the weeds and ground in the yard; without very distinct chestnut crowns."); October 7, 1860 (“Now and for a week the chip-birds in flocks; the withered grass and weeds, etc., alive with them.”) See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Chipping Sparrow

Aster Tradescanti is perhaps beginning to whiten the shores on moist banks. See  September 1, 1853 ("That small aster which I call A. Tradescanti, with crowded racemes, somewhat rolled or cylindrical to appearance, of small white flowers a third of an inch in diameter, with yellow disks turning reddish or purplish, is very pretty by the low roadsides, resounding with the hum of honey-bees; which is commonly despised for its smallness and commonness, — with crowded systems of little suns."); September 1, 1856 ("A. Tradescanti, got to be pretty common, but not yet in prime.") See also September 7, 1858 ("And now the moist banks and low hollows are beginning to be abundantly sugared with Aster Tradescantia"); September 10, 1853 ("The Aster Tradescanti, now in its prime, sugars the banks all along the riverside with a profusion of small white blossoms resounding with the hum of bees."): September 13, 1856 ("The Aster Tradescanti now sugars the banks densely, since I left, a week ago. Nature improves this her last opportunity to empty her lap of flowers."); September 14, 1854 ("The banks have now begun fairly to be sugared with the Aster Tradescanti."); September 14, 1856 ("Now for the Aster Tradescanti along low roads, like the Turnpike, swarming with butterflies and bees. Some of them are pink.")

I see a fine (reddish) topped grass in low lands, whitened like a thin veil with what it has caught of this dewy rain.. See September 10, 1860 (" Leaving Lowell at 7 A. M. in the cars, I observed and admired the dew on a fine grass in the meadows, which was almost as white and silvery as frost when the rays of the newly risen sun fell on it . . .Almost every plant, however humble, has thus its day, and sooner or later becomes the characteristic feature of some part of the landscape or other.")

The Cornus sericea berries are now in prime, of different shades of blue, lighter or darker, and bluish white. See August 31, 1856 ("The Cornus sericea, with its berries just turning, is generally a dull purple now . ."); August 28, 1856 ("The bright china-colored blue berries of the Cornus sericea begin to show themselves along the river, . . .."). See also September 3, 1853 ("Now is the season for those comparatively rare but beautiful wild berries which are not food for man.. . .Berries which are as beautiful as flowers, but far less known, the fruit of the flower.")

The fall of the birches... (due to drought).  See August 19, 1854 ("Many white birches long since lost the greater part of their leaves, which cover the ground, sere and brown as in autumn.")

September 1. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, September 1

Do not the sparrows 

now begin to feed on seeds

 of weeds in gardens? 

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Misty, mizzling rain begins the fall.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau

 "A book, each page written in its own season,

out-of-doors, in its own locality."

 ~edited, assembled and rewritten by zphx ©  2009-2024

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-540901