Speaking of the meadow-hay which is lost this year.

September 30

Cattle-Show. 

An overcast, mizzling, and rainy day. 

Minott tells of a General Hull, who lived some where in this county, who, he remembers, called out the whole division once or twice to a muster. He sold the army under him to the English in the last war, — though General Miller of Lincoln besought to let him lead them, — and never was happy after it, had no peace of mind. It was said that his life was in danger here in consequence of his treason. 

Once, at a muster in front of the Hayden house, when there was a sham fight, and an Indian party took a circuit round a piece of wood, some put green grapes into their guns, and he, hearing one whistle by his head, thought some one wished to shoot him and ordered them to disperse, — dismissed them. 

Speaking of the meadow-hay which is lost this year, Minott said that the little they had got since the last flood before this was good for nothing, would only poison the cattle, being covered with the dried slime and filth of the freshet. When you mowed it there arose a great dust. He spoke of this grass, thus left over winter to next year, as "old fog." 

Said that Clark (Daniel or Brooks) asked him the other day what made so many young alders and birches and willows spring up in the river meadows of late years; it didn't use to be so forty or fifty years ago; and he told him that in old times, when they were accustomed to take something strong to drink, they didn't stand for such shrubs but mowed all clear as they went, but now, not feeling so much energy for want of the stimulant, when they came to a bush, though no bigger than a pipe-stem, they mowed all round it and left it standing.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 30, 1856

Minott tells of a General Hull, who lived some where in this county. [William Hull ( 1753-1825) moved to his wife's family estate in Newton after the Revolution and served as a judge and state senator until Jefferson appointed him Governor of the Michigan where he surrendered Fort Detroit to the British on August 16, 1812.]

Speaking of the meadow-hay which is lost this year. See August 1, 1856 (“Unfortunate those who have not got their hay. I see them wading in overflowed meadows and pitching the black and mouldy swaths about in vain that they may dry."); August 22, 1856 (“I see much hay floating, and two or three cocks, quite black, carried round and round in a great eddy by the side of the stream,");  August 30, 1856 ("Rain again in the night, as well as most of yesterday  raising the river a second time. They say there has not been such a year as this for more than half a century."); September 25, 1856 ("The river has risen again considerably (this I believe the fourth time) . . . before the farmers have succeeded in their late attempt to get their meadow-hay."); October 4, 1856 ("I hear that a Captain Hurd  of Wayland or Sudbury, estimates the loss of river meadow-hay this season in those two towns on account of the freshet at twelve hundred tons.")

What made so many young alders and birches and willows spring up in the river meadows of late years. See August 25, 1856 ("Why do maples, alders, etc., at present border the stream, though they do not spring up to any extent in the open meadow?"); August 3, 1856 ("In a meadow now being mown I see that the ferns and small osiers are as thick as the grass. If modern farmers do not collect elm and other leaves for their cattle, they do thus mow and cure the willows, etc., etc., to a considerable extent, so that they come to large bushes or trees only on the edge of the meadow.")

 Minott said the hay

they got in since the last flood

was good for nothing.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  Speaking of the meadow-hay 

 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 ©  2009-2026

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-560930

How surely the desmodium or the bidens prophesy the coming of the traveller, brute or human, that will transport their seeds on his coat!

September 29

 P. M. — To Grape Cliff. 

September 29, 2016

The pea-vine fruit is partly ripe, little black-dotted beans, about three in a pod. 

I can hardly clamber along the grape cliff now with out getting my clothes covered with desmodium ticks, — there especially the rotundifolium and paniculatum. Though you were running for your life, they would have time to catch and cling to your clothes, — often piece of a saw blade with three teeth. You pause at a convenient place and spend a long time picking them off, which it took so short a time to attach. They will even cling to your hand as you go by. They cling like babes to the mother's breast, by instinct. Instead of being caught and detained ourselves by birdlime, we are compelled to catch these seeds and carry them with us. 

These almost invisible nets, as it were, are spread for us, and whole coveys of desmodium and bidens seeds and burs steal transportation out of us. I have found myself often covered, as it were with an imbricated scaly coat of the brown desmodium seeds or a bristling chevaux-de-frise of beggar-ticks, and had to spend a quarter of an hour or more picking them off at some convenient place; and so they got just what they wanted, deposited in another place. 

How surely the desmodium, growing on some rough cliff-side, or the bidens, on the edge of a pool, prophesy the coming of the traveller, brute or human, that will transport their seeds on his coat! 

I am late for grapes; most have fallen. The fruit of what I have called Vitis aestivalis has partly fallen. It is dark-purple, about seven sixteenths of an inch in diameter, very acid and commonly hard. Stem and petiole smooth and purplish, but leaf not smooth or green beneath. Should not this be called frost grape, rather than the earlier one I ate at Brattleboro? Grapes are singularly various for a wild fruit, like many cultivated ones. 

Dr. Reynolds told me the other day of a Canada lynx (?) killed in Andover, in a swamp, some years ago, when he was teaching school in Tewksbury; thought to be one of a pair, the other being killed or seen in Derry. Its large track was seen in the snow in Tewksbury and traced to Andover and back. They saw where it had leaped thirty feet! and where it devoured rabbits. Was on a tree when shot. Skin stuffed some where.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 29, 1856

Though you were running for your life, they would have time to catch and cling to your clothes, — often piece of a saw blade with three teeth.  See August 7, 1856 ("At Blackberry Steep, apparently an early broad-leafed variety of Desmodium paniculatum, two or three days. This and similar plants are common there and may almost name the place . . . All these plants seem to love a dry open hillside, a steep one. Are rarely upright, but spreading, wand-like."); August 26, 1856 ("These desmodiums are so fine and inobvious that it is difficult to detect them. I go through a grove in vain, but when I get away, find my coat covered with their pods. They found me, though I did not them.”); September 10, 1851 ("The Desmodium paniculatum of De Candolle and Gray (Hedysarum paniculatum of Linnaeus and Bigelow), tick-trefoil, with still one blossom, by the path-side up from the meadow. The rhomboidal joints of its loments adhere to my clothes. One of an interesting family that thus disperse themselves.")     See also October 2, 1852 ("The beggar-ticks (Bidens) now adhere to my clothes. I also find the desmodium sooner thus. . . than if I used my eyes alone."); October 23, 1853 ("I find my clothes all bristling as with a chevaux-de-frise of beggar-ticks, which hold on for many days. A storm of arrows these weeds have showered on me, as I went through their moats. How irksome the task to rid one's self of them! We are fain to let some adhere. Through thick and thin I wear some; hold on many days. In an instant a thousand seeds of the bidens fastened themselves firmly to my clothes, and I carried them for miles, planting one here and another there. “);  October 12, 1851 ("The seeds of the bidens,-without florets, beggar-ticks, with four-barbed awns like hay-hooks, now adhere to your clothes, so that you are all bristling with them. Certainly they adhere to nothing so readily as to woolen cloth, as if in the creation of them the invention of woolen clothing by man had been foreseen. How tenacious of its purpose to spread and plant its race. By all methods nature secures this end, whether by the balloon, or parachute, or hook, or barbed spear like this, or mere lightness which the winds can waft.")

I am late for grapes; most have fallen.  See September 27, 1858 ("Grapes have begun to shrivel on their stems. They drop off on the slightest touch, and if they fall into the water are lost, going to the bottom. You see the grape leaves touched with frost curled up and looking crisp on their edges"); October 1, 1853 ("Grapevines, curled, crisped, and browned by the frosts, are now more conspicuous than ever. Some grapes still hang on the vines."); October 2, 1857 ("Grape leaves were killed and crisped by the last frost.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Grape

A Canada lynx killed in Andover, in a swamp, some years ago .See Natural History of Massachusetts (1842) ("The bear, wolf, lynx, wildcat, deer, beaver, and marten have disappeared "); March 23, 1856 ("I consider that the nobler animals have been exterminated here, — the cougar, panther, lynx, wolverene, wolf, bear, moose, deer, the beaver, the turkey, etc., etc., — I cannot but feel as if I lived in a tamed, and, as it were, emasculated country."); September 9, 1856) ("The most interesting sight I saw in Brattleboro was the skin and skull of a panther . . .It gave one a new idea of our American forests and the vigor of nature here."); September 11, 1860 ("George Melvin came to tell me this forenoon that a strange animal was killed on Sunday. . ."); September 13, 1860 ("Five [lynx] I have heard of (and seen three) killed within some fifteen or eighteen miles of Concord within thirty years past."); October 17, 1860 ("[I]t belongs here, - I call it the Concord lynx."); November 29, 1860("I have thought that a lynx was a bright-eyed, four-legged, furry beast of the cat kind. But he knew it to be a draught drawn by the cashier of the wildcat bank on the State treasury, payable at sight.")

The desmodium 

prophesy the traveller

that will transport seeds.

 A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  How surely the desmodium or the bidens prophesy the coming of the traveller

 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 ©  2009-2026

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-560929

Scarlet berry season.

September 28 

P. M. — To old mill-site behind Ponkawtasset.

The arum berries are still fresh and abundant, perhaps in their prime. A large cluster is two and a half inches long by two wide and rather flattish. One, which has ripened prematurely, the stalk being withered and drooping, resembles a very short thick ear of scarlet corn. This might well enough be called snake-corn. These singular vermilion-colored berries, about a hundred of them, surmount a purple bag on a peduncle six or eight inches long. 

It is one of the most remarkable and dazzling, if not the handsomest, fruits we have. These were by violet wood-sorrel wall. 

Black or purplish-black

poke berries hanging around

the bright-purple stems.

(poison)

Poke berries in the sprout-land east of the red huckleberry still fresh and abundant, perhaps a little past prime. I never saw so many. The plants stand close together, and their drooping racemes three to five inches long, of black or purplish-black berries , almost crowd one another, hanging around the bright-purple, now for the most part bare, stems.

I hear some birds about, but see none feeding on the berries. I could soon gather bushels there. 


How many fruits are scarlet now! — barberries, prinos, etc.

A flock of vireo-like, somewhat yellowish birds, very neat, white beneath and olive above, in garden.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 28, 1856


Poke, arum. See August 23, 1853 ("Poke stems are now ripe . . .Their stems are a deep, rich purple with a bloom, contrasting with the clear green leaves. Its stalks, thus full of purple wine, are one of the fruits of autumn.");  August 28, 1856 ("See the great oval masses of scarlet berries of the arum now in the meadows."); September 2, 1853 (" The dense oval bunches of arum berries now startle the walker in swamps. They are a brilliant vermilion.”); September 3, 1853  ("Now is the season for those comparatively rare but beautiful wild berries which are not food for man."); September 27, 1852 ("The arum berries are now in perfection, cone-shaped spikes an inch and a half long, of scarlet or vermilion- colored, irregular, somewhat pear-shaped berries springing from a purplish core.") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Arum Berries

How many fruits are scarlet now! See September 28, 1851 ("The swamp is bordered with the red-berried alder, or prinos,") See also August 22, 1852 ("Perhaps fruits are colored like the trillium berry and the scarlet thorn to attract birds to them.")

September 28.  See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, September 28

The arum berries 

are still fresh and abundant –

perhaps in their prime. 

 A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Scarlet berry season.

 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 ©  2009-2026

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-560928

There is a slight coolness in the air, yet the sun is occasionally very warm.

September 27

September 27, 2014

The bluebird family revisit their box and warble as in spring. 

P. M. — To Clamshell by boat. 

Solidago speciosa not quite out!! 

Viburnum nudum berries are soon gone. I noticed none to speak of in Hubbard's Swamp, September 15th. 

Start up a snipe in the meadow. 

Bathed at Hubbard's Bath, but found the water very cold. Bathing about over. 

It is a very fine afternoon to be on the water, some what Indian-summer-like. I do not know what constitutes the peculiarity and charm of this weather; the broad water so smooth, notwithstanding the slight wind, as if, owing to some oiliness, the wind slid over without ruffling it. There is a slight coolness in the air, yet the sun is occasionally very warm. 

I am tempted to say that the air is singularly clear, yet I see it is quite hazy. Perhaps it is that transparency it is said to possess when full of moisture and before or after rain. Through this I see the colors of trees and shrubs beginning to put on their October dress, and the creak of the mole cricket sounds late along the shore. 

The Aster multiflorus may easily be confounded with the A. Tradescanti. Like it, it whitens the roadside in some places. It has purplish disks, but a less straggling top than the Tradescanti.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 27, 1856

The bluebird family revisit their box. See September 12, 1854 ("I see plump young bluebirds in small flocks along the fences.");  October 10, 1851 ("The air this morning is full of bluebirds, and again it is spring."); October 20, 1855 ("Eighteen and more bluebirds, perhaps preparing to migrate.")

Viburnum nudum berries are soon gone. See September 3, 1856 ("Gather four or five quarts of Viburnum nudum berries, now in their prime, attracted more by the beauty of the cymes than the flavor of the fruit. The berries, which are of various sizes and forms, — elliptical, oblong, or globular, — are in different stages of maturity on the same cyme, and so of different colors, — green or white, rose-colored, and dark purple or black."); September 18, 1859 ("I have seen no Viburnum nudum berries for some time. They are considerably earlier than the V. Lentago"); September 24, 1854 ("The Viburnum Lentago berries now turn blue-black in pocket, as the nudum did, which last are now all gone, while the Lentago is now just in season. ")  See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Viburnums

Bathing about over. See  September 2, 1854 ("Bathe at Hubbard’s. The water is surprisingly cold . . . It is a very important and remarkable autumnal change. It will not be warm again probably."); September 12, 1854 ("I find it colder again than on the 2d, so that I stay in but a moment."); September 26, 1854 ("Took my last bath the 24th. Probably shall not bathe again this year. It was chilling cold.") See also  A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Luxury of Bathing

A very fine afternoon to be on the water, some what Indian-summer-like . . . There is a slight coolness in the air, yet the sun is occasionally very warm.  See September 21, 1854 ("A fine-grained air, seething or shimmering as I look over the fields, reminds me of the Indian summer that is to come.") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Indian Summer

The creak of the mole cricket sounds late along the shore.  See September 27, 1855 ("I traced the note of what I have falsely thought the Rana palustris, or cricket frog, to its true source [and] I found a mole cricket (Gryllotalpa brevipennis)."); August 22, 1856 ("The creak of the mole cricket is heard along the shore."); August 18, 1853 ("What means this sense of lateness that so comes over one now") See also  A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Cricket in August; A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Cricket in Spring and "What Thoreau Heard in the Song of the Crickets" by Lewis Hyde, NYT Sept. 23, 2023.

The Aster multiflorus may easily be confounded with the A. Tradescanti. See  September 1, 1856 ("A. Tradescanti, got to be pretty common, but not yet in prime."); September 13, 1856 ("The Aster Tradescanti now sugars the banks densely . . . Nature improves this her last opportunity to empty her lap of flowers."); September 14, 1856 ("Now for the Aster Tradescanti along low roads, like the Turnpike, swarming with butterflies and bees. Some of them are pink."); September 21, 1858 ("Saw no Aster Tradescanti in this walk, but an abundance of A. multiflorus in its prime, in Salem and Marblehead.")

September 27. See A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, September 27

Colors through clear air –

the trees and shrubs putting on 

their October dress.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Coolness in the air

 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 ©  2009-2026

https://tinyurl.com/HDT560927

The haws of the common thorn are now very good eating and handsome

September 25

The river has risen again considerably (this I believe the fourth time), owing to the late copious rains. This before the farmers have succeeded in their late attempt to get their meadow-hay after all. It had not got down before this last rain but to within some eighteen inches, at least, of the usual level in September. 

P. M. — To Harrington road. 

A golden-crowned thrush runs off, a few feet at a time, on hillside on Harrington road, as if she had a nest still! 

The haws of the common thorn are now very good eating and handsome. Some of the Crataegus Crus-Galli on the old fence line between Tarbell and T. Wheeler beyond brook are smaller, stale, and not good at all. 

The urtica just beyond Widow Hosmer's barn appears the same with that I called U. gracilis (?) in Brattleboro.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 25, 1856

The river has risen again . . . before the farmers have succeeded in their late attempt to get their meadow-hay . . . See August 24, 1856 ("The river meadows probably will not be mown this year. I can hardly get under the stone bridge without striking my boat.”)

A golden-crowned thrush runs off . . . as if she had a nest still! See June 18, 1854 ("Observe in two places golden-crowned thrushes, near whose nests I must have been.”); August 6, 1852 (“With the goldenrod comes the goldfinch. About the time his cool twitter is heard, does not the . . . oven-bird, etc . cease?”); August 23, 1858 ("I see a golden-crowned thrush, but it is silent except a chip; sitting low on a twig near the main stem of a tree, in these deep woods ") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  The Oven-bird

The haws of the common thorn are now very good eating and handsome. See September 23, 1852 ("I gathered some haws very good to eat to-day."); September 24, 1859 ("Those thorns by Shattuck's barn, now nearly leafless, have hard green fruit as usual.")

Crataegus Crus-Galli on the old fence line. [Crataegus crus-galli (cockspur thorn) is a species of hawthorn.]  See  May 29, 1853 ("The Cratægus Crus-Galli this side the Holden place on left, probably yesterday, thorns three inches long, flowers with anthers not conspicuously red.");June 10, 1856 ("The Crataegus Crus-Galli is out of bloom”); March 16, 1855 ("At the woodchuck’s hole just beyond the cockspur thorn”).

The urtica just beyond Widow Hosmer's barn appears the same with that I called U. gracilis (?) [Slender Stinging Nettle] in Brattleboro. See September 21, 1856 ("Such is the advantage of going abroad, — to enable to detect your own plants. I detected them first abroad, because there I was looking for the strange.")

September 25. See A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, September 25

A golden-crowned thrush 

runs off a few feet as if 

she had a nest still.

 A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, A golden-crowned thrush 

 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 ©  2009-2026

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-560925

Methinks it stands thus with goldenrods and asters now.

September 24. 

P. M. — To Saw Mill Brook. 

Not a sign of an artichoke flower yet below Moore's! May they not be earlier elsewhere? 

At brook, cohush and arum berries still fresh, and Viburnum acerifolium berries. 

Apparently Asplenium Thelypteroides, a large fern, its under side covered with linear fruit. 

Methinks it stands thus with goldenrods and asters now:

Early S. stricia, done some time.
Swamp "   " probably past prime.
My S. gigantea (?), probably done.
S. nemoralis, about done.
S. altissima, much past prime.
S. odora, not seen but probably done.
S. puberula, say in good condition, or in prime.

S. bicolor and var. concolor, in prime.
S. lanceolata, say done.
S. lalifolia, in prime.
S. casta, in prime.
S. speciosa (none the 15th).

Early meadow aster, say done long time.

Diplopappus cornifolius, not seen of late.
D. umbellatus, still abundant.
A. patens, some still fresh but not common.
A. macrophyllus, not observed of late.
A. acuminatum, not observed at all in C.
A. Radula, probably about done, not seen of late.
A. dumosus, considerably past prime. D. linariifolius, in prime, abundant.
A. undulatus, in prime, abundant.
A. corymbosus, still fresh though probably past prime.
A. laevis, probably still in prime.
A. Tradescanli, in prime.
A. puniceus, still in prime (??).
A. hngifolius, in prime.
A. multiflorus, in prime.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 24, 1856 

Not a sign of an artichoke flower yet . . . See October 5, 1860 ("The frosts have this year killed all of Stow's artichokes before one of them had blossomed, but those in Alcott's garden had bloomed probably a fortnight ago.”)

Cohush and arum berries still fresh, and Viburnum acerifolium berries . . . See September 1, 1856 ("Cohush berries appear now to be in their prime, and arum berries”); September 3, 1853 ("Now is the season for those comparatively rare but beautiful wild berries which are not food for man. . . .”)

Goldenrods and asters. See September 1, 1856  ("I think it stands about thus with asters and golden- rods now. . .”); August 21, 1856 ("The prevailing solidagos now are, 1st, stricta (the upland and also meadow one which I seem to have called puberula); 2d, the three-ribbed, of apparently several varieties, which I have called arguta or gigantea (apparently truly the last); 3d, altissima, though commonly only a part of its panicles; 4th, nemoralis, just beginning generally to bloom.Then there is the odora, 5th, out some time, but not common; and, 6th, the bicolor, just begun in some places. The commonest asters now are, 1st, the Radula; 2d, dumosus; 3d, patens; 4th, say puniceus; 5th, cordtfolius; 6th, macrophyllus; (these two a good while); 7th, say Tradescanti ; 8th, miser; 9th, longifolius ; (these three quite rare yet); 10th, probably acuminatus, some time (not seen); 11th, undulatus ; 12th, loevis; (these two scarcely to be seen yet). “)

Pennyroyal tea.

September 22

A rainy day. 

Tried some pennyroyal tea, but found it too medicinal for my taste. Yet I collect these herbs, biding the time when their use shall be discovered.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 22, 1856

I collect these herbs.  See August 11, 1853 ("Evening draws on while I am gathering bundles of pennyroyal on the further Conantum height. I find it amid the stubble mixed with blue-curls and, as fast as I get my hand full, tie it into a fragrant bundle.”); August 13, 1852 ("Pennyroyal abundant in bloom. I find it springing from the soil lodged on large rocks in sprout-lands, and gather a little bundle, which scents my pocket for many days."); August 13, 1856 (“Is there not now a prevalence of aromatic herbs in prime? — The polygala roots, blue-curls, wormwood, pennyroyal, . . . etc., etc. Does not the season require this tonic?“); August 26, 1856 ("I gather a bundle of pennyroyal; it grows largest and rankest high and close under these rocks, amid the loose stones.") See also December 14, 1855 ("In a little hollow I see the sere gray pennyroyal rising above the snow, which, snuffed, reminds me of garrets full of herbs.”) and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Aromatic Herbs

September 22. See A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau,  September 22

I collect these herbs . . .

biding the time when their use 

shall be discovered.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Pennyroyal tea

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 ©  2009-2026

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-560922

The advantage of going abroad

September 21 

September 21, 2015

P. M. — To Cliffs. 

Asclepias Cornuti discounting. The seeded parachutes which I release soon come to earth, but probably if they waited for a stronger wind to release them they would be carried far. 

Solidago nemoralis mostly done. 

Aster undulatus in prime, in the dry woods just beyond Hayden's, large slanting, pyramidal panicles of some lilac-tinged, others quite white, flowers, size of Diplopappus linariifolius. 

Solidago altissima past prime. 

Prinos berries. 

I hear of late faint chewink notes in the shrubbery, as if they were meditating their strains in a subdued tone against another year. 

A. dumosus past prime. 

Am surprised to see on top of Cliffs, where Wheeler burned in the spring and had cut rye, by a large rock, some very large perfectly fresh Corydalis glauca, still well in bloom as well as gone to seed, two and a half feet high and five eighths of an inch thick at base. There are also many large tufts of its glaucous leaves on the black burnt ground which have not come to flower, amid the rye stubble. The bumblebees are sucking its flowers. 

Beside the young oak and the sprouts, poke-weed, erechthites, and this corydalis even are common there. How far is this due to the fire, aside from the clearing? 

Was not the fireweed seed sown by the wind last fall, blown into the woods, where there was a lull which caused it to settle? Perhaps it is fitted to escape or resist fire. The wind which the fire creates may, perchance, lift it again out of harm's way.

The Asclepias obtusifolia is turned yellow. I see its often perfectly upright slender pod five inches long. It soon bursts in my chamber and shows its beautiful straw- colored lining. A fairy-like casket, shaped like a canoe, with its closely packed imbricated brown seeds, with their yet compressed silvery parachutes like finest unsoiled silk in the right position above them, ready to be wafted some dry and breezy day to their destined places. 

On top of Cliff, behind the big stump, a yellow white goldenrod, var. concolor, which Gray refers to Pennsylvania, apparently with the common. That is a great place for white goldenrod, now in its prime and swarming with honey-bees. 

Scare up turtle doves in the stubble. Uva-ursi berries quite ripe. 

Find, for first time in Concord, Solanum nigrum, berries apparently just ripe, by a rock northwest of corydalis. Thus I have within a week found in Concord two of the new plants I found up-country. Such is the advantage of going abroad, — to enable [you] to detect your own plants. I detected them first abroad, because there I was looking for the strange. 

It is a warm and very hazy day, with wreaths of mist in horizon.

See, in the cow-killer on railroad, a small mountain-ash naturalized!

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 21, 1856

Asclepias Cornuti discounting . . . if they waited for a stronger wind to release them they would be carried far. See September 10, 1860 ("If you sit at an open attic window almost anywhere, about the 20th of September, you will see many a milkweed down go sailing by on a level with you, though commonly it has lost its freight, — notwithstanding that you may not know of any of these plants growing in your neighborhood.");   October 8, 1851 ("The milkweed seeds must be carried far, for it is only when a strong wind is blowing that they are loosened from their pods.") 

Milkweed seeds loosen

only when a strong wind blows –

so they carry far.

 October 8, 1851 

October 19, 1856 ("The Asclepias Cornuti pods are now apparently in the midst of discounting.");   October 23, 1852 ("The milkweed (Syriaca) now rapidly discounting . . .the seeds spring out on the least jar, or when dried by the sun, and form a little fluctuating white silky mass or tuft, each held by the extremities of the fine threads, until a stronger puff of wind sets them free"); October 25, 1858 ("Near the end of the causeway, milkweed is copiously discounting."); November 20, 1858 ("The common milkweed (Asclepias Cornuti) and some thistles still discounting.") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau,  Milkweed.

Late faint chewink notes in the shrubbery . . . See September 21, 1854 (" Hear the chewink and the cluck of the thrasher."); September 19, 1858 ("Hear a chewink’s chewink. But how ineffectual is the note of a bird now! We hear it as if we heard it not, and forget it immediately.") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Chewink  (Rufous-sided Towhee)

White goldenrod, now in its prime and swarming with honey-bees. See August 12, 1852 ("Solidago bicolor, white goldenrod, apparently in good season");  August 21, 1856 ("The bicolor, just begun in some places. "); October 2, 1856 ("Solidago bicolor considerably past prime"); Octpber 8, 1856 ("S. bicolor in some places, are common still");   October 11, 1856 ("The white goldenrod is still common here, and covered with bees.");  October 26, 1852 ("The blue-stemmed and white goldenrod apparently survive till winter. – push up and blossom anew.") 

Within a week found in Concord two of the new plants I found up-country. See September 10, 1856 ("Descending the steep south end of this hill [Fall Mountain near Bellow Falls], I saw an apparent Corydalis glauca . . .  By the railroad below, the Solanum nigrum, with white flowers but yet green fruit.") See also September 22, 1859 ("The Solanum nigrum, which is rare in Concord, with many flowers and green fruit.")

Such is the advantage of going abroad, — to enable to detect your own plants. I detected them first abroad, because there I was looking for the strange. See March 11, 1856 ("Only that travelling is good which reveals to me the value of home and enables me to enjoy it better"); August 6, 1851 ("It takes a man of genius to travel in his own country, in his native village; to make any progress between his door and his gate."); September 19, 1853 ("[the Maine woods] I looked very narrowly at the vegetation as we glided along close to the shore. . . that I might see what was primitive about our Concord River."); September 2, 1856 ("It commonly chances that I make my most interesting botanical discoveries when I am in a thrilled and expectant mood . . . prepared for strange things.");  September 19, 1856 ("Am surprised to find the Polygonum Pennsylvanicum abundant, by the roadside near the bank. First saw it the other day at Brattleboro."); November 4, 1858 ("We cannot see any thing until we are possessed with the idea of it, and then we can hardly see anything else.")

September 21. See A Book of the Seasons: September 21

It is a warm and 

very hazy day – wreaths of 

mist in horizon.

You first detect your

own plants when abroad – because 

looking for the strange.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The advantage of going abroad

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 ©  2009-2026

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