A strange warbler in Moore's Swamp

June 

June 15.
To Moore’s Swamp. 






Robin’s nest in apple tree, twelve feet high — young nearly grown.

Hair-bird’s nest on main limb of an apple tree, horizontal, ten feet high. 

Many pollywogs an inch long.

In the swamp a catbird’s nest in the darkest and thickest part, in a high blueberry, five feet from ground, two eggs; bird comes within three feet while I am looking. 

Viburnum nudum, how long? Not long. 

Wool(?)-grass. 

I see a strange warbler still in this swamp. A chestnut and gray backed bird, five or six inches long, with a black throat and yellow crown; note, chit chit chill le le, or chut chut a wutter chut a wut, che che. 

Crimson frosting on maple leaves. 

The swamp pyrus twigs are in some places curving over and swollen, and curling up at ends, forming bunches of leaves.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, June 15, 1855

Robin’s nest in apple tree, twelve feet high — young nearly grown. See June 15, 1852 ("Young robins, dark-speckled,")

Viburnum nudum, how long? See June 10, 1854 ("The Viburnum lentago is just out of bloom now that the V. nudum is fairly begun.)


Wool-grass. See June 15, 1858 ("That coarse grass in the Island meadow which grows in full circles . . . is wool-grass. . . The peculiarly circular form of the patches, sometimes their projecting edges being the arcs of circles, is very obvious now that the lower and different grass around is under water”)


Hair-bird’s [chipping sparrow’s] nest on main limb of an apple tree, horizontal, ten feet high. See June 20, 1855 (“Two hair-birds’ nests fifteen feet high on apple trees at R.W.E.’s (one with two eggs).”)

Many pollywogs an inch long. See June 15, 1851 ("The pollywogs in the pond are now fulltailed")
A chestnut and gray backed bird, five or six inches long, with a black throat and yellow crown. See note to June 15, 1854 (“Saw there also, probably, a chestnut-sided warbler. A yellow crown, chestnut stripe on sides, white beneath, and two yellowish bars on wings.”)