April 30, 2018
P. M. – I carry the rest of my little fishes, fifteen or twenty, to the cold pool in Hubbard's ground. They are about a quarter-inch long still, and have scarcely increased in length.
I learn that one farmer, seeing me standing a long time still in the midst of a pool (I was watching for hylodes), said that it was his father, who had been drinking some of Pat Haggerty's rum, and had lost his way home. So, setting out to lead him home, he discovered that it was I.
I find a Fringilla melodia nest with five eggs. Part, at least, must have been laid before the snow of the 27th, but it is perfectly sheltered under the shelving turf and grass on the brink of a ditch. The snow would not even have touched the bird sitting on them.
It is much warmer, and now for the first time since April 23d I find frogs out. (Perhaps I could have found some yesterday.)
I noticed one of the large scroll ferns, with its rusty wool, up eight inches on the 28th.
See a white-throated sparrow by Cheney's wall, the stout, chubby bird.
After sundown. By riverside. —The frogs and toads are now fairly awake. Both are most musical now at evening. I hear now on various sides, along the river and its meadows, that low, stertorous sound, like that of the Rana halecina, – which I have heard occasionally for a few days. (I also hear it in Stow's field by railroad, with toads’ ringing.) It is exceedingly like the note of the R. halecina, yet I fancy it is some what more softly purring, with frequently a low quivering, chuckling, or inquisitive croak, which last takes the place of the bullfrog-like er er er of the halecina. This is the only difference between it and the halecina that I am sure of. The short quivering croak reminds me of the alarm (?) note of the hylodes. I suspect it is the R. palustris, now breeding.
I hear no snipe.
Frogs, etc., are perfect thermometers. Some that I had in a firkin were chilled to stiffness, while their fellows buried themselves again in the mud of the meadows; i.e., in a cold night at this season they are stiffened in a tub of water, the small R. palustris, not being able to bury themselves in mud. They appear to lose their limbs or portions of them, which slough off in consequence.
H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 30, 1858
I find a Fringilla melodia nest with five eggs. See June 14, 1855 ("A song sparrow’s nest in ditch bank under Clamshell, of coarse grass lined with fine, and five eggs nearly hatched and a peculiar dark end to them."); June 9, 1855 ("A song sparrow’s nest low in Wheeler’s meadow, with five eggs, made of grass lined with hair."); May 27, 1856 ("Fringilla melodia’s nest in midst of swamp, with four eggs, made partly of usnea; . . . eggs with very dark blotches"); May 31, 1856 (“A ground-bird’s nest (melodia or graminea.), with six of those oblong narrow gray eggs speckled with much brown at end. ") See also A Book of Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Song Sparrow (Fringilla melodia)
Standing a long time still in the midst of a pool watching for hylodes. See April 18, 1858 ("All that is required in studying them is patience"); and note to March 27, 1853 ("Stood perfectly still amid the bushes on the shore, before one showed himself; finally five or six, and all eyed me, gradually approached me within three feet to reconnoitre, and, though I waited about half an hour, would not utter a sound.")
It is some what more softly purring, with frequently a low quivering, chuckling, or inquisitive croak. See May 23, 1856 ("The ring of toads is loud and incessant. . . .At the same time I hear a low, stertorous, dry, but hard-cored note from some frog in the meadows and along the riverside; often heard in past years but not accounted for. Is it a Rana palustris?"); May 8. 1857 ("It is an evening for the soft-snoring, purring frogs (which I suspect to be Rana palustris). . . . Their croak is very fine or rapid, and has a soft, purring sound at a little distance.") A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Rana palustris Pickerel frog (Lithobates palustris)
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