Such is the first hot weather.

May 7. 

May  7, 2019

Saturday. Surveying Damon's Acton lot. 

It is hotter still, — 88° or more, as I hear in the afternoon. 

I frequently see pigeons dashing about in small flocks, or three or four at a time, over the woods here. Theirs is a peculiarly swift, dashing flight. 

The mayflower is still sparingly in bloom on what I will call Mayflower Path in this lot. It is almost the prevailing undershrub here. 

I think I hear the redstart. 

To-day and yesterday the sunlight is peculiarly yellow, on account of the smoky haze. I notice its peculiar yellowness, almost orange, even when, coming through a knot-hole in a dark room, it falls on the opposite wall. 

Such is the first hot weather.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 7, 1856


I think I hear the redstart. See May 16, 1858 (“See and hear a redstart, the rhythm of whose strain is tse'-tse, tse'-tse, tse', emphasizing the last syllable of all and not ending with the common tsear”); May 17, 1856 (“At the Kalmia Swamp, see and hear the redstart, very lively and restless, flirting and spreading its reddish tail.”) See also  A Book of Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The American Redstart

A sunset walk. We walk to the view getting a late start, around 630 At the view there are beacons of light shining at spots all over the landscape through broken clouds. Parts of the lake are illuminated parts of the golf course suddenly bright bright green. 

The maple leaves are now lacy against the sky and probably will be forming shadows. The small maples go straight to leaf but the adult trees still have no leaves. This spring green color of the tree flowers is coloring the valley and the grass is bright green

It is obviously going to be an incredibly good sunset. Gradually the clouds break up and we see the peachy orange color in the west. The mountains are blue to dark purple. Whiteface is concealed.

We wait until the sun is down and then notice the beam of red light illuminating the clouds behind the Adirondacks like a red fan silhouette in the mountains. Many pictures to document this beautiful evening.

Meanwhile through the hike we hear the hermit thrush,'the wood thrush, the oven bird, the black throated green the sapsuckers tapping and perhaps others. Rose breasted grosbeak – Jane has been waiting for that it; today it first is heard.

Just as the sun sets the peepers in the lower pond start up in earnest.

 May 7