I love this moisture in its season.

Rhexia virgini

August 1. 

Burdock, several days at least. Erechthites, apparently two or three days, by Peter's Path, end of Cemetery, the middle flowers first.

Crotalaria in fine lechea field, how long? Still out, and some pods fully grown. 

Liatris will apparently open in a day or two. 

Diplopappus umbellatus at Peter's wall. Desmodium Canadense, some time; several great stems five feet high, a little spreading. 

August 01, 2016

Since July 30th, inclusive, we have had perfect dog-days without interruption. The earth has suddenly invested with a thick musty mist. The sky has become a mere fungus. A thick blue musty veil of mist is drawn before the sun. The sun has not been visible, except for a moment or two once or twice a day, all this time, nor the stars by night. Moisture reigns. 

You cannot dry a napkin at the window, nor press flowers without their mildewing. You imbibe so much moisture from the atmosphere that you are not so thirsty, nor is bathing so grateful as a week ago. The burning heat is tempered, but as you lose sight of the sky and imbibe the musty, misty air, you exist as a vegetable, a fungus. 

Unfortunate those who have not got their hay. I see them wading in overflowed meadows and pitching fthe black and mouldy swaths about in vain that they may dry. In the meanwhile, vegetation is becoming rank, vines of all kinds are rampant. Squashes and melons are said to grow a foot in a night. But weeds grow as fast. The corn unrolls. Berries abound and attain their full size. 

Once or twice in the day there is an imperfect gleam of yellow sunlight for a moment through some thinner part of the veil, reminding us that we have not seen the sun so long, but no blue sky is revealed. The earth is completely invested with cloud like wreaths of vapor (yet fear no rain and need no veil), beneath which flies buzz hollowly and torment, and mosquitoes hum and sting as if they were born of such an air. 

The drooping spirits of mosquitoes revive, and they whet their stings anew. Legions of buzzing flies blacken the furniture. (For a week at least have heard that snapping sound under pads.) We have a dense fog every night, which lifts itself but a short distance during the day. At sundown I see it curling up from the river and meadows. 

However, I love this moisture in its season. I believe it is good to breathe, wholesome as a vapor bath.

Toadstools shoot up in the yards and paths. 

The Great Meadows being a little wet, — hardly so much as usual, — I took off my shoes and went barefoot some two miles through the cut-grass, from Peter's to Sphaerocarpa Pools and backward by river. Very little grass cut there yet. The cut-grass is bad for tender feet, and you must be careful not to let it draw through your hands, for it will cut like a fine saw. 

I was surprised to see dense beds of rhexia in full bloom there, apparently on hummocks a rod in diameter left by the ice, or in long ridges mixed with ferns and some Lysimachia lanceolata, arrowhead, etc. They make a splendid show, these brilliant rose-colored patches, especially in the neighborhood of Copan. It is about the richest color to be seen now. Yet few ever see them in this perfection, unless the haymaker who levels them, or the birds that fly over the meadow. 

Far in the broad wet meadows, on the hummocks and ridges, these bright beds of rhexia turn their faces to the heavens, seen only by the bitterns and other meadow birds that fly over. We, dwelling and walking on the dry upland, do not suspect their existence. How obvious and gay to those creatures that fly over the meadow! Seen only by birds and mowers. These gay standards otherwise unfurled in vain. 

Snake-head arethusa still in the meadow there. 

Ludwigia sphaerocarpa apparently a week out, a foot and a half to two feet high.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, August 1, 1856

Liatris will apparently open in a day or two See );August 26, 1858 ("The liatris is about (or nearly) in prime."); September 6, 1859 ("The liatris is, perhaps, a little past prime. It is a very rich purple in favorable lights and makes a great show where it grows."); September 28, 1858 ("Liatris done, apparently some time.").

Perfect dog-days without interruption. See July 30, 1856 (“This is a perfect dog-day. The atmosphere thick, mildewy, cloudy. It is difficult to dry anything. The sun is obscured, yet we expect no rain”)

Snake-head arethusa still in the meadow there. See July 7, 1856 ("The snake-head arethusa is now abundant amid the cranberries”) See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Snakemouth Orchid

Far in the broad wet meadows, on the hummocks and ridges, these bright beds of rhexia turn their faces to the heavens, seen only by the bitterns and other meadow birds that fly over. See July 18, 1852 ("The petals of the rhexia have a beautiful clear purple with a violet tinge."); and note to August 5, 1858 ("I cannot sufficiently admire the rhexia, one of the highest-colored purple flowers, but difficult to bring home in its perfection, with its fugacious petals.")