I see a female marsh hawk sailing and hunting over Potter's Swamp.

March 21. 

6 a. m. — The water has fairly begun to fall. 

It was at its height the 17th; fell a little — two or three inches — the morning of the 18th. On the - 18th it rained very considerably all day, which would ordinarily have raised the river a foot, or perhaps two, but, the wind being very strong from the southwest, it only prevented its falling any more until this morning. It did not probably raise it more than two inches. 

Of course, there could not have been much melted snow and ice to be added to the last rain about the sources of the river, since they are considerably further south, where the ground must have been much more bare than here.

A crow blackbird. 

P. M. — Sail to Fair Haven Pond. A strong northwest wind. 

Draw my boat over the road on a roller. Raising a stone for ballast from the south side of the railroad causeway, where it is quite sunny and warm, I find the undersides very densely covered with little ants, all stirring and evidently ready to come out, if some have not already. They feel the heat through the stone on the ground. 

It blowed very smartly in gusts, and my boat scud along this way and that, not minding its helm much, as if it were lifted partly out of water. I went from point to point as quickly as you could say "here" and "there."

I see a female marsh hawk sailing and hunting over Potter's Swamp. I not only see the white rump but the very peculiar crescent-shaped curve of its wings. 

Fair Haven Pond is only two thirds open. 

The east end is frozen still, and the body of the ice has drifted in to shore a rod or two, before the northwest wind, and its edge crumbled against the trees. 

I see, on a yellow lily root washed up, leaf-buds grown five or six inches, or even seven or eight, with the stems. 

Everywhere for several days the alder catkins have dangled long and loose, the most alive apparently of any tree. They seem to welcome the water which half covers them. 

The willow catkins are also very conspicuous, in silvery masses rising above the flood. 

I see several white pine cones in the path by Wheildon's which appear to have fallen in the late strong winds, but perhaps the ice in the winter took them off. Others still hold on. 

From the evening of March 18th to this, the evening of the 21st, we have had uninterrupted strong wind, — till the evening of the 19th very strong south west wind, then and since northwest, — three days of strong wind.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, March 21, 1859


I see a female marsh hawk. . I not only see the white rump but the very peculiar crescent-shaped curve of its wings. See  March 29, 1854 ("See two marsh hawks, white on rump");  April 23, 1855 ("See a frog hawk beating the bushes regularly. What a peculiarly formed wing! It should be called the kite. Its wings are very narrow and pointed, and its form in front is a remarkable curve, and its body is not heavy . . I have seen also for some weeks occasionally a brown hawk with white rump, flying low, which I have thought the frog hawk in a different stage of plumage; but can it be at this season? and is it not the marsh hawk? . . . probably female hen-harrier [i. e. marsh hawk]");. May 1, 1855 (" What I have called the frog hawk is probably the male hen-harrier, . . .MacGillivray . . .says . . . the large brown bird with white rump is the female"); March 17, 1860 ("Was not that a marsh hawk, a slate-colored one which I saw flying over Walden Wood with long, slender, curving wings, with a diving, zigzag flight? [No doubt it was, for I see another, a brown one, the 19th.]”). See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau,  the Marsh Hawk (Northern Harrier)

Fair Haven Pond is only two thirds open. See  March 22, 1855 ("I cross Fair Haven Pond, including the river, on the ice, and probably can for three or four days yet. "); March 22, 1854 ("Fair Haven still covered and frozen anew in part.");   March 20, 1858 ("Fair Haven is still closed."); March 26, 1860 ("Fair Haven Pond may be open by the 20th of March, as this year, or not till April 13 as in '56")

Everywhere for several days the alder catkins have dangled long and loose, the most alive apparently of any tree See March 20, 1853 ("Those alder catkins on the west side of Walden tremble and undulate in the wind, they are so relaxed and ready to bloom, — the most forward blossom-buds.");  March 22, 1853 ("The very earliest alder is in bloom and sheds its pollen. I detect a few catkins at a distance by their distinct yellowish color. This the first native flower"); March 23, 1853 ("The alder catkins, just burst open, are prettily marked spirally by streaks of yellow, contrasting with alternate rows of rich reddish-brown scales, which make one revolution in the length of the catkin.")

The willow catkins are also very conspicuous, in silvery masses rising above the flood. See March 22, 1854 ("The now silvery willow catkins shine along the shore over the cold water."); March 22, 1856 ("The down of willow catkins in very warm places has in almost every case peeped out an eighth of an inch, generally over the whole willow"); March 20, 1858 (“How handsome the willow catkins! Those wonderfully bright silvery buttons, so regularly disposed in oval schools in the air, or, if you please, along the seams which their twigs make, in all degrees of forwardness, from the faintest, tiniest speck of silver, just peeping from beneath the black scales, to lusty pussies which have thrown off their scaly coats and show some redness at base on a close inspection.”);  March 20,1859. ("When I get opposite the end of the willow-row, the sun comes out and they are very handsome, like a rosette, pale-tawny or fawn-colored at base and a rich yellow or orange yellow in the upper three or four feet.  This is, methinks, the brightest object in the landscape these days.")

I see several white pine cones in the path by Wheildon's which appear to have fallen in the late strong winds. See note to March 5, 1860 ("White pine cones half fallen.")

Pine cones in the path

fallen in the late strong winds –

others still hold on.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, A marsh hawk sailing over Potter's Swamp

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 © 2009-2024

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