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| April 27, 2018 |
The tortoises are stirring much more.
Frogs appear to love warm and moist weather, rainy or cloudy. They will sit thickly along the shore, apparently small bullfrogs, etc., R. palustris.
My young fishes had the pectoral fins and tail very early developing, but not yet can I detect any other fins with my glass. They had mouths, which I saw them open as soon as hatched, and more and more a perch-like head. I think that with Hoar's microscope I detected two dorsal fins such as the perch have. When I put them suddenly in the sun they sink and rest on the bottom a moment.
In the French work for schools of Edwards and Comte, it is said that the perch spawns not till the age of three years, and in the spring. “The ova are joined together by some glutinous matter in long strings (codons) intertwined with the reeds.” (Page 36.)
I noticed yesterday that again the newly laid spawn at the cold pool on Hubbard's land was all gone, and that in the larger pool south of it was much diminished. What creature devours it?
Snows hard in afternoon and evening. Quite wintry. About an inch on ground the next morning.
H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 27, 1858
It has been so cold since the 23d that I have not been able to catch a single frog. See April 24, 1858 (“This shows how sensitive they are to changes of temperature. Hardly one puts its head out of the water, if ever he creeps out the grassy or muddy bottom this cold day. ”)
The newly laid spawn at the cold pool on Hubbard's land was all gone. See April 22, 1858 (“The spawn of April 18th is gone! It was fresh there and apparently some creature has eaten it.”)
Snows hard in afternoon and evening. Quite wintry. See note to April 2, 1861 ("A drifting snow-storm, perhaps a foot deep on an average.”)
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