Walden apparently froze over last night.

January 6. 

Walden apparently froze over last night. 

It is but little more than an inch thick, and two or three square rods by Hubbard's shore are still open. A dark, transparent ice. It would not have frozen entirely over, as it were in one night, or maybe a little more, and yet have been so thin next the shore as well as in the middle, if it had not been so late in the winter, and so ready to freeze. It is a dark, transparent ice, but will not bear me without much cracking. 

As I walked along the edge, I started out three little pickerel no longer than my finger from close to the shore, which went wiggling into deeper water like bloodsuckers or pollywogs. 

When I lie down on it and examine it closely, I find that the greater part of the bubbles which I had thought were within its own substance are against its under surface, and that they are continually rising up from the bottom, — perfect spheres, apparently, and very beautiful and clear, in which I see my face through this thin ice (perhaps an inch and an eighth), from one eightieth of an inch in diameter, or a mere point, up to one eighth of an inch. 

There are thirty or forty of these, at least, to every square inch. These, probably, when heated by the sun, make it crack and whoop. There are, also, within the substance of the ice, oblong perpendicular bubbles half an inch long, more or less, by about one thirtieth of an inch, and these are commonly widest at the bottom (?), or, oftener, separate minute spherical bubbles of equal or smaller diameter, one directly above another, like a string of beads, perhaps the first stage of the former. But these internal bubbles are not nearly so numerous as those in the water beneath. 

It may be twenty-four hours since the ice began to form decidedly. 

I see, on the sandy bottom a few inches beneath, the white cases of caddis-worms made of the white quartz sand or pebbles. And the bottom is very much creased or furrowed where some creature has travelled about and doubled on its tracks, — perhaps the caddis-worm, for I find one or two of the same in the furrows, though the latter are deep and broad for them to make. 

This morning the weeds and twigs and fences were covered with what I may call a leaf frost, the leaves a third of an inch long, shaped somewhat like this, with triangular points, but very thin. Another morning there will be no frost. 

I forgot to say yesterday that I picked up four pignuts by the squirrel's hole, from which he had picked the meat, having gnawed a hole about half the diameter of the nut in width on each side. After I got home I observed that in each case the holes were on the sides of the nut and not on the edges, and I cut into a couple with my knife in order to see certainly which was the best way to get at the meat. 

Cutting into the edge, I came upon the thick partition which runs the whole length of the nut, and then came upon the edges of the meats, and finally was obliged to cut away a good part of the nut on both edges before I could extract the meat, because it was held by the neck in the middle. 

But when I cut holes on the sides, not only the partitions I met with were thin and partial, but I struck the meats broadside and extracted them with less trouble. It may be that it is most convenient for the squirrel to hold the nut thus, but I think there is a deeper reason than that. 

I observe that, out of six whole pignuts which I picked from a tree, three are so cracked transversely to the division of the meat that I can easily pry them open with my knife. 

They hang on as food for animals.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, January 6, 1853

Walden apparently froze over last night. See December 27, 1852 ("Not a particle of ice in Walden to-day. Paddled across it. I took my new boat out. A black and white duck on it."); . January 2, 1853 ("Walden begins to freeze in the coves or shallower water on the north side, where it was slightly skimmed over several weeks ago"); January 3, 1853 ("Walden not yet frozen.")

When I lie down on it and examine it closely, I find that the greater part of the bubbles are continually rising up from the bottom, — perfect spheres, very beautiful and clear, in which I see my face through this thin ice. June 3, 1854 ("On the pond we make bubbles with our paddles on the smooth surface, in which little hemispherical cases we see ourselves and boat, small, black and distinct, with a fainter reflection on the opposite side of the bubble (head to head).")

This morning the weeds and twigs and fences were covered with what I may call a leaf frost. See December 31, 1855 ("It is one of the mornings of creation, and the trees, shrubs, etc., etc., are covered with a fine leaf frost, as if they had their morning robes on, seen against the sun.")

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, January 6.

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 © 2009-2022

The signs of cold weather./ Open places on the river.between Lee's Bridge and Carlisle Bridge

 December  28.

December 28, 2019

 In the morning the windows  are like ground glass (covered with frost), and we cannot see out. Sleds creak or squeak along the dry and hard snow-path. Crows come near the houses. These are among the signs of cold weather.

The open places in the river yesterday between Lee's Bridge and Carlisle Bridge were : 

• 1st, below Nut Meadow Brook, a rather shoal place; 
• 2d, at Clamshell Bend, longer; 
• 3d, at Hubbard's Bath Bend; 
• 31/2, was there not a little open at ash tree? '); 
• 4th, I think there was a short opening at Lee's Bend;[Or, rather, I think it was thinly frozen ?]
• 5th, from Monroe's to Merrick's pasture; 
• 6th, below junction to bridge; 
• 7th, below French's Rock;
•  8th, Barrett's Bar. 
• N. B. — Did not observe or examine between this and the shoal below the Holt.It was no doubt open at the last place and perhaps more. 
• There was no opening between the Holt shoal and Carlisle Bridge, for there was none on the 25th. 

The most solidly frozen portions are the broad and straight reaches. All broad bays are frozen hard. When you come to where the river is winding, there is shallower and swifter water — and open places as yet.

It is remarkable that the river should so suddenly contract at Pelham Pond. It begins to be Musketaquid there. 

The places where the river was certainly (i. e. except 4th) open yesterday were all only five feet or less in depth, according to my map, and all except 8th at bends or else below the mouth of a brook. And all places not more than five and a quarter feet deep were open (I am doubtful only about behind Rhodes) except above Holt Bend and perhaps Pad Island, or possibly none need be excepted. 

Hence, I should say, if you wish to ascertain where the river is five feet, or less than five feet, deep in Concord, wait till it is open for not more than half a dozen rods below Nut Meadow (it was probably 'some twenty the 27th), and then all open places will be five or less than five feet deep.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 28, 1859

In the morning the windows are like ground glass (covered with frost), and we cannot see out. See January 4, 1856 ("It is snapping cold this night (10 P. M.). I see the frost on the windows sparkle as I go through the passageway with a light ")'; February 1, 1860 ("Grows colder apace toward night. Frost forms on windows."); February 5, 1855 ("It was quite cold last evening, and I saw the scuttle window reflecting the lamp from a myriad brilliant points when I went up to bed."); February 17, 1860 ("Grows colder yet at evening, and frost forms on the windows.")

Crows come near the houses. These are among the signs of cold weather, See January 23, 1852 ("The snow is so deep and the cold so intense that the crows are compelled to be very bold in seeking their food, and come very near the houses in the village.”); December 27, 1853 (“The crows come nearer to the houses, alight on trees by the roadside, apparently being put to it for food.”) January 7, 1856 ("The cold weather has brought the crows, and for the first time this winter I hear them cawing amid the houses")

It is remarkable that the river should so suddenly contract at Pelham Pond. It begins to be Musketaquid there. See January 31, 1855 ("I skated up as far as the boundary between Wayland and Sudbury just above Pelham’s Pond, about twelve miles, . . . It was, all the way that I skated, a chain of meadows, with the muskrat-houses still rising above the ice.")

The open places in the river. See March 26, 1860 ("Tried by various tests, this season fluctuates more or less.. . .The river may be either only transiently closed, as in '52-'53 and '57-'58, or it may not be open entirely (up to pond) till April 4th.");  January 28. 1853 ("These two or three have been the coldest days of the winter, and the river is generally closed. . .and the sun-sparkles where the river is open are very cheerful to behold."); December 19, 1854 ("Last night was so cold that the river closed up almost everywhere, and made good skating where there had been no ice to catch the snow of the night before"); January 19, 1856 (“The only open place in the river between Hunt’s Bridge and the railroad bridge is a small space against Merrick’s pasture just below the Rock”); January 20, 1856 ("It is remarkable that the short strip in the middle below the Island yesterday should be the only'open place between Hunt’s Bridge and Hubbard’s, at least, -—-probably as far as Lee’s. The river has been frozen solidly ever since the 7th,");  January 24, 1856(“You may walk anywhere on the river now. Even the open space against Merrick’s, below the Rock, has been closed again . . .”); February 27, 1856 "(The river has been frozen solidly for seven weeks"); March 20, 1856 ("The river has just begun to open at Hubbard’s Bend. It has been closed there since January 7th, i. e. ten weeks and a half."); January 20, 1857 ("The river has been frozen everywhere except at the very few swiftest places since about December 18th, and everywhere since about January 1st."); January 23, 1858 ("I have not been able to walk up the North Branch this winter, nor along the channel of the South Branch at any time."); January 24, 1858 ("The river is broadly open, as usual this winter. . . . What is a winter without snow and ice in this latitude? ")

What a change there will be in a few years, this little forest of goldenrod giving place to a forest of pines!

December 17.

P. M. — To Walden.

The snow being some three or four inches deep, I see rising above it, generally, at my old bean-field, only my little white pines set last spring in the midst of an immense field of Solidago nemoralis, with a little sweet-fern (i.e. a large patch of it on the north side).

What a change there will be in a few years, this little forest of goldenrod giving place to a forest of pines!

By the side of the Pout's Nest, I see on the pure white snow what looks like dust for half a dozen inches under a twig. Looking closely, I find that the twig is hardhack and the dust its slender, light-brown, chaffy looking seed, which falls still in copious showers, dusting the snow, when I jar it; and here are the tracks of a sparrow which has jarred the twig and picked the minute seeds a long time, making quite a hole in the snow. The seeds are so fine that it must have got more snow than seed at each peck. But they probably look large to its microscopic eyes.

I see, when I jar it, that a meadow-sweet close by has quite similar, but larger, seeds.

This the reason, then, that these plants rise so high above the snow and retain their seed, dispersing it on the least jar over each successive layer of snow beneath them; or it is carried to a distance by the wind.

What abundance and what variety in the diet of these small granivorous birds, while I find only a few nuts still!

These stiff weeds which no snow can break down hold their provender. What the cereals are to men, these are to the sparrows. The only threshing they require is that the birds fly against their spikes or stalks.

A little further I see the seed-box (?) (Ludwigia) full of still smaller, yellowish seeds.

And on the ridge north is the track of a partridge amid the shrubs. It has hopped up to the low clusters of smooth sumach berries, sprinkled the snow with them, and eaten all but a few. Also, here only, or where it has evidently jarred them down — whether intentionally or not, I am not sure — are the large oval seeds of the stiff-stalked lespedeza, which I suspect it ate, with the sumach berries. There is much solid food in them. When the snow is deep the birds could easily pick the latter out of the heads as they stand on the snow.

I observe, then, eaten by birds to-day, the seed of hardhack and meadow-sweet, sumach, and probably lespedeza, and even seed-box.

Under the hill, on the southeast side of R. W. E.'s lot, where the hemlock stands, I see many tracks of squirrels. The dark, thick green of the hemlock (amid the pines) seems to attract them as a covert. The snow under the hemlock is strewn with the scales of its cones, which they (and perhaps birds?) have stripped off, and some of its little winged seeds. It is pleasant to see the tracks of these squirrels (I am not sure whether they are red or gray or both, for I see none) leading straight from the base of one tree to that of another, thus leaving untrodden triangles, squares, and polygons of every form, bounded by much trodden highways.

One, two, three, and the track is lost on the upright bole of a pine, — as if they had played at base-running from goal to goal, while pine cones were thrown at them on the way. The tracks of two or three suggest a multitude. You come thus on the tracks of these frisky and volatile (semivolitant) creatures in the midst of perfect stillness and solitude, as you might stand in a hall half an hour after the dancers had departed.

I see no nests in the trees, but numerous holes through the snow into the earth, whence they have emerged. They have loitered but little on the snow, spending their time chiefly on the trees, their castles, when abroad.

The snow is strewn not only with hemlock scales, but, under other trees, with the large white pine scales for rods together where there is no track, the wind having scattered them as they fell, and also the shells of hickory-nuts. It reminds me of the platform before a grocery where nuts are sold.

You see many places where they have probed the snow for these white pine cones, evidently those which they cut off green and which accordingly have not opened so as to drop the seeds. This was perhaps the design in cut ting them off so early, — thus to preserve them under the snow (not dispersed). Do they find them by the scent?

At any rate they will dig down through the snow and come right upon a pine cone or a hickory-nut or an acorn, which you and I cannot do.

Two or three acres of Walden, off the bar, not yet frozen.

Saw in [it] a good-sized black duck, which did not dive while I looked. I suspect it must have been a Fuligula, though I saw no white.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 17, 1859

What abundance and what variety in the diet of these small granivorous birds. These stiff weeds which no snow can break down hold their provender.  See January 16, 1860 ("Though you may have never noticed this shrub, the tree sparrow comes from the north in the winter straight to it, and confidently shakes its panicle, and then feasts on the fine shower of seed that falls from it. The bird understands how to get its dinner perfectly.")

Two or three acres of Walden, off the bar, not yet frozen. Saw in it a good-sized black duck. See December 27, 1852 ("Not a particle of ice in Walden to-day. . . . A black and white duck on it, Flint's and Fair Haven being frozen up.")

Winter twilights, morn and eve, are very clear and light, very glorious and pure

December 8. 

December 8, 2023

7 a. m. — How can we spare to be abroad in the morning red, to see the forms of the leafless eastern trees against the dun sky and hear the cocks crow, when a thin low mist hangs over the ice and frost in meadows? 

I have come along the riverside in Merrick's pasture to collect for kindling the fat pine roots and knots which the spearers dropped last spring, and which the floods have washed up. Get a heaping bushel-basketful. 

The thin, trembling sheets of imperfectly cemented ice or ice-crystals, loosened by the warmth of the day, now go floating down the stream, looking like dark ripples in the twilight and grating against the edges of the firm ice. They completely fill the river where it is bridged with firmer ice below. 

I observe a place on the shore where a small circle of the withered grass was feathered white with frost, and, putting down my hand, felt the muskrat's hole in the bank which was concealed to my eye. I often see this, and at woodchuck-holes. Yet you may see the same over the edge of many a hole, however shallow. 

At midday (3 p. m.) see an owl fly from toward the river and alight on Mrs. Richardson's front-yard fence. Got quite near it, and follow it to a rock on the heap of dirt at Collier's cellar. 

A rather dark brown owl above (with a decided owl head (and eyes), though not very broad), with longitudinal tawny streaks (or the reverse), none transverse, growing lighter down the breast, and at length clear rusty yellowish or cream color beneath and about feathered feet. Wings large and long, with a distinct large black spot beneath; bill and claws, I think, black. Saw no ears. Kept turning its head and great black eyes this way and that when 'it heard me, but appeared not to see me. Saw my shadow better, for I approached on the sunny side. 

I am inclined to think it the short-eared owl, though I could see no ears, though it reminded [me] of what I had read of the hawk owl. It was a foot or more long and spread about three feet. Flew somewhat flappingly, yet hawk-like. Went within two or three rods of it. 

Walden at sunset. 

The twilights, morn and eve, are very clear and light, very glorious and pure, or stained with red, and prolonged, these days. But, now the sun is set, Walden (I am on the east side) is more light than the sky, -— a. whiteness as of silver plating, while the sky is yellowish in the horizon and a dusky blue above. 

Though the water is smooth enough, the trees are lengthened dimly one third in the reflection. Is this phenomenon peculiar to this season? 

[ The next night but one just like this, a little later. I saw from the peak the entire reflection of large white pines very distinctly against a clear white sky, though the actual tree was completely lost in night against the dark distant hillside. ]

Goose Pond now firmly frozen. It had melted since it froze before. I see there a narrow open channel in the ice, two and a half rods long and six inches wide, leading straight to a muskrat-house by the shore, apparently kept open by them. 

Snow will soon come, in a measure to restore the equilibrium between night and day by prolonging the twilight. 

I was amused by R. W. E.’s telling me that he drove his own calf out of the yard, as it was coming in with the cow, not knowing it to be his own, a drove going by at the time.

H. D. Thoreau,  Journal, December 8, 1853

I often see this, and at woodchuck-holes. Yet you may see the same over the edge of many a hole, however shallow. See November 13, 1858 (“There is frost . . .thick and white and handsome around the throat of every hole and chink in the earth’s surface,. . . so that you would think at first it was the entry to some woodchuck’s, or squirrel’s, or mouse’s, retreat. But it is the great dormant earth gone into winter quarters here, the earth letting off steam after the summer’s work is over.”)

See an owl fly from toward the river and alight on Mrs. Richardson's front-yard fence. See December 16, 1853 (“Some creature has killed ten, at least, of H. Wheeler's doves and left them together in the dove-house. I think it was my short-eared owl, which flew thither.”)

Walden (I am on the east side) is more light than the sky, See November 30, 1852 (There was more light in the water than in the sky.");  December 9, 1856 ("I look over the pond westward. The sun is near setting,. . . The pond is perfectly smooth and full of light.") 

I saw from the peak the entire reflection of large white pines very distinctly against a clear white sky, though the actual tree was completely lost in night against the dark distant hillside.  See December 11, 1853 ("In the case of the reflections. . .we see terrestrial objects with the sky or heavens for a background or field."); December 9, 1856 ("As I look now over the pond westward, I see in substance the now bare outline of Fair Haven Hill a mile beyond, but in the reflection I see not this, only the tops of some pines, which stand close to the shore but are invisible against the dark hill beyond.") See also October 16, 1858 (“[Objects] appear in the reflection as they would if viewed from that point on the surface from which they are reflected to my eye, so that it is as if I had another eye placed there to see for me.”)

Goose Pond now firmly frozen. See December 4, 1853 ("Goose Pond apparently froze over last night, all but a few rods, but not thick enough to bear.”); December 13, 1857 (“This and the like ponds are just covered with virgin ice just thick enough to bear, though it cracks about the edges”);(December 27, 1857 ("Goose Pond is not thickly frozen yet . . .in many places water has oozed out and spread over the ice, mixing with the snow and making dark places.”)

He drove his own calf out of the yard, a drove going by at the time. See December 8, 1850 (“”A week ago I saw cows being driven home from pasture. Now they are kept at home. Here 's an end to their grazing.);  October 28, 1858 ("Cattle coming down from up country.")

tinyurl.com/HDT531208

Now after sunset the light of the western sky – the outlines of pines.

December 25

December 25, 2018

P. M. —Up river on ice to Fair Haven Pond and across to Walden. 

The ground is still for the most part bare. Such a December is at least as hard a month to get through as November. You come near eating your heart now.

There is a good deal of brown or straw-color in the landscape now, especially in the meadows, where the ranker grasses, many of them uncut, still stand. They are bleached a shade or two lighter. Looking from the sun, there is a good deal of warm sunlight in them. 

I see where one farmer has been getting this withered sedge on the ice within a day or two for litter, in a meadow which had not been cut. Of course he could not cut very close. 

The ice on the river is about half covered with light snow, it being drifted thus, as usual, by the wind. (On Walden, however, which is more sheltered, the ice is uniformly covered and white.) I go running and sliding from one such snow-patch to another. It is easiest walking on the snow, which gives a hold to my feet, but I walk feebly on the ice. It is so rough that it is but poor sliding withal. 

I see, in the thin snow along by the button-bushes and willows just this side of the Hubbard bridge, a new track to me, looking even somewhat as if made by a row of large rain-drops, but it is the track of some small animal. The separate tracks are at most five eighths of an inch in diameter, nearly round, and one and three quarters to two inches apart, varying perhaps half an inch from a straight line. Sometimes they are three or four inches apart. The size is but little larger than that of a mouse, but it is never like a mouse. Goodwin, to whom I described it, did not know what it could be. 

The sun getting low now, say at 3.30, I see the ice green, southeast. 

Goodwin says that he once had a partridge strike a twig or limb in the woods as she flew, so that she fell and he secured her. 

Going across to Walden, I see that the fuzzy purple wool-grass is now bleached to a dark straw-color with out any purple. 

I notice that a fox has taken pretty much my own course along the Andromeda Ponds. 

The sedge which grows in tufts eighteen or twenty inches high there is generally recurving. 

I see that the shiners which Goodwin is using for bait to-day have no longitudinal dark bar or line on their sides, such as those minnows of the 11th and 18th had. Yet I thought that by the position of their fins, etc., the latter could not be the banded minnow. 

Walden at length skimmed over last night, i. e. the two holes that remained open. One was very near the middle and deepest part, the other between that and the railroad. 

Now that the sun is setting, all its light seems to glance over the snow-clad pond and strike the rocky shore under the pitch pines at the northeast end. Though the bare rocky shore there is only a foot or a foot and a half high as I look, it reflects so much light that the rocks are singularly distinct, as if the pond showed its teeth. 

I stayed later to hear the pond crack, but it did not much. 

December 25, 2019

How full of soft, pure light the western sky now, after sunset! I love to see the outlines of the pines against it. Unless you watch it, you do not know when the sun goes down. It is like a candle extinguished without smoke. A moment ago you saw that glittering orb amid the dry oak leaves in the horizon, and now you can detect no trace of it. In a pensive mood I enjoy the complexion of the winter sky at this hour.

Those small sphagnous mountains in the Andromeda Ponds are grotesque things. Being frozen, they bear me up like moss-clad rocks and make it easy getting through the water-brush. 

But for all voice in that serene hour I hear an owl hoot. How glad I am to hear him rather than the most eloquent man of the age! 

I saw a few days ago the ground under a swamp white oak in the river meadow quite strewn with brown dry galls about as big as a pea and quite round, like a small fruit which had fallen from it.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 25, 1858

As hard a month to get through as November. You come near eating your heart now. See November 27, 1853 ("Now a man will eat his heart, if ever, now while the earth is bare, barren and cheerless, and we have the coldness of winter without the variety of ice and snow"); November 25, 1857 (“November Eatheart, — is that the name of it? “)

Looking from the sun, there is a good deal of warm sunlight in them. See January 4, 1858 (“It is surprising how much sunny light a little straw that survives the winter will reflect . . .
That bright and warm reflection of sunlight from the insignificant edging of stubble”)

I notice that a fox has taken pretty much my own course along the Andromeda Ponds. See December 13, 1859 ("I see that the fox too has already taken the same walk before me, just along the edge of the button-bushes, where not even he can go in the summer.”)

The shiners which Goodwin is using for bait to-day have no longitudinal dark bar or line on their sides. See March 29, 1854 ("poised over the sand on invisible fins, the outlines of a shiner. . . distinct longitudinal light-colored line midway along their sides and a darker line below it”); July 16, 1856 ("I see many young shiners (?) (they have the longitudinal bar)"): July 17, 1856 (“They have . . . a broad, distinct black band along sides (which methinks marks the shiner)"); December 11, 1858 (“a minnow — apparently a young shiner, but it has a dark longitudinal line along side ”); December 18, 1858 (“They are little shiners with the dark longitudinal stripe”)

The sun getting low now, say at 3.30, I see the ice green, southeast. See January 7, 1856 (“Returning just before sunset, the few little patches of ice look green as I go from the sun . . .It is probably a constant phenomenon in cold weather when the ground is covered with snow and the sun is low, morning or evening, and you are looking from it.”); February 12, 1860 ("Returning just before sunset, I see the ice beginning to be green.”)

Walden at length skimmed over last night, i. e. the two holes that remained open. See note to December 20, 1858 (“Walden is frozen over, except two small spots, less than half an acre in all, in middle.”); December 22, 1858 (“The pond is no more frozen than on the 20th.”); December 24, 1858 ("Those two places in middle of Walden not frozen over yet, though it was quite cold last night! "); December 28, 1858 (“The ice is about six inches thick.”) See also December 25, 1859 ("The last our coldest night, as yet. No doubt Walden froze over last night entirely.") and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Annual ice-in at Walden

Now that the sun is setting, all its light seems to glance over the snow-clad pond and strike the rocky shore under the pitch pines at the northeast end. See December 25, 1858 ("That rocky shore under the pitch pines which so reflects the light, is only three feet wide by one foot high")

Unless you watch it, you do not know when the sun goes down.  See December 25, 1851 (“I go forth to see the sun set. Who knows how it will set, even half an hour beforehand ?”); See also July 20, 1852 (“We see the first star in the southwest, and know not how much earlier we might have seen it had we looked.”)

How full of soft, pure light the western sky now, after sunset! I love to see the outlines of the pines against it.

Full of soft pure light

western sky after sunset –

the outlines of pines.

December 25, 1858

See December 3, 1856   ("The pine forest's edge seen against the winter horizon"); December 12, 1859 ("The night comes on early these days, and I soon see the pine tree tops distinctly outlined against the dun (or amber) but cold western sky."); December 20, 1851 (In the west the sun goes down apace behind glowing pines, and golden clouds like mountains skirt the horizon."); January 5, 1853 ("A fine rosy sky in the west after sunset; and later an amber-colored horizon, in which a single tree-top showed finely."); January 9, 1859 ("It is worth the while to stand here at this hour and look into the soft western sky, over the pines whose outlines are so rich and distinct against the clear sky."); January 19, 1859 ("It occurs to me that I know of no more agreeable object to bound our view . . . than the pyramidal tops of a white pine forest in the horizon.");  See also October 20, 1858 ("There is one advantage in walking eastward these afternoons, at least, that in returning you may have the western sky before you.");   December 8, 1854 (“There is a glorious clear sunset sky, soft and delicate and warm”); December 9, 1859 (“I observe at mid-afternoon that peculiarly softened western sky . . . giving it a slight greenish tinge.”); December 11, 1854 ("I see the sun setting far through the woods, and there is that peculiar clear vitreous greenish sky in the west, as it were a molten gem.The day is short; it seems to be composed of two twilights merely"); December 18, 1853 (“The western hills, these bordering it, seen through the clear, cold air, have a hard, distinct edge against the sunset sky.”); January 17, 1852 (“In proportion as I have celestial thoughts, is the necessity for me to be out and behold the western sky sunset these winter days")

Clear yellow light of

the western sky reflected

from the smooth water.

November 15, 1853

Night comes on early.  

Pine tree tops outlined against

the cold western sky,

December 12, 1859

To look over pines

so rich and distinct into

the soft western sky.

January 9, 1859

The unclouded mind,

serene, pure, ineffable

like the western sky.

January 17, 1852

See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Western Sky

I hear an owl hoot. How glad I am to hear him. See November 18, 1851 ("I rejoice that there are owls. . . . This sound faintly suggests the infinite roominess of nature”); January 7, 1854 (“It is a sound which the wood or horizon makes”) See also A Book of Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Voice of the Barred Owl

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

Now after sunset

the light of the western sky –

the outlines of pines.

I hear an owl hoot.

How glad I am to hear him

in this serene hour.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the outlines of pines.

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

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-581225

The fourth shrike.

December 24. 

Those two places in middle of Walden not frozen over yet, though it was quite cold last night! 

See another shrike this afternoon, — the fourth this winter! It looks much smaller than a jay.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 24, 1858

Those two places in middle of Walden. See December 20, 1858 (“Walden is frozen over, except two small spots, less than half an acre in all, in middle.”)

Another shrike this afternoon, — the fourth this winter! See December 24, 1850 ("Saw a shrike pecking to pieces a small bird, apparently a snowbird. At length he took him up in his bill, almost half as big as himself, and flew slowly off with his prey dangling from his beak. I find that I had not associated such actions with my idea of birds It was not birdlike ."); See also November 29, 1858 ("I see a living shrike caught to-day in the barn of the Middlesex House.”); December 12, 1858 (“See a shrike on a dead pine”);December 23, 1858 ("See a shrike on the top of an oak.”). and November 4, 1854 (“Saw a shrike in an apple tree, with apparently a worm in its mouth. ”); December 29, 1855 (“Just before reaching the Cut I see a shrike flying low beneath the level of the railroad, which rises and alights on the topmost twig of an elm within four or five rods. All ash or bluish-slate above down to middle of wings; dirty-white breast, and a broad black mark through eyes on side of head; primaries(?) black, and some white appears when it flies. Most distinctive its small hooked bill (upper mandible).It makes no sound, but flits to the top of an oak further off. Probably a male.”);  December 30, 1859 ("I see a shrike perched on the tip-top of the topmost upright twig of an English cherry tree before his house, standing square on the topmost bud, balancing himself by a slight motion of his tail from time to time.") February 3, 1856 (“see near the Island a shrike glide by, cold and blustering as it was, with a remarkably even and steady sail or gliding motion like a hawk, eight or ten feet above the ground, and alight in a tree”); February 5, 1859 ("I see another butcher-bird on the top of a young tree by the pond."):   See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Northern Shrike

Walden is frozen over.

December 20. 

Walden is frozen over, except two small spots, less than half an acre in all, in middle.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 20, 1858

Walden is frozen over. See December 11, 1858 ("Walden is about one-third skimmed over.");  December 22, 1858 (“The pond is no more frozen than on the 20th.”); December 24, 1858 ("Those two places in middle of Walden not frozen over yet, though it was quite cold last night! "); December 25, 1858 ("Walden at length skimmed over last night, i. e. the two holes that remained open. One was very near the middle and deepest part, the other between that and the railroad.”); December 28, 1858 (“The ice is about six inches thick.”)

See also December 21, 1854 "Walden is frozen over, apparently about two inches thick. It must have frozen, the whole of it, since the snow of the 18th,-— probably the night of the 18th");
December 21, 1855 (“Walden is skimmed over, all but an acre, in my cove.”); December 21, 1856 ("The pond is open again in the middle, owing to the rain of yesterday."); December 22, 1853 ("Walden skimmed over in the widest part, but some acres still open; will probably freeze entirely to-night if this weather holds.”); December 23, 1845 ("The pond froze over last night entirely for the first time, yet so as not to be safe to walk upon”); December 23, 1850 ("Walden is frozen, one third of it, though I thought it was all frozen as I stood on the shore on one side only"); December 24, 1856 ("Am surprised to find Walden still open in the middle.”); December 24, 1859 ("There is, in all, an acre or two in Walden not yet frozen, though half of it has been frozen more than a week"); December 26, 1850 ("Walden not yet more than half frozen over."); December 26, 1853 ("Walden still open.. . . the only pond hereabouts that is open."); December 27, 1852 ("Not a particle of ice in Walden to-day. Paddled across it.);  December 27, 1856 "Walden is still open in one place of considerable extent, just off the east cape of long southern bay.");. December 27, 1857 ("Walden is almost entirely skimmed over. It will probably be completely frozen over to-night");. December 28, 1856 ("Walden completely frozen over again last night."); December 29, 1855 ("Am surprised to find eight or ten acres of Walden still open,. . .It must be owing to the wind partly.");December 30, 1853 ("The pond not yet frozen entirely over; about six acres open, the wind blew so hard last night. "); December 30, 1855 ("There was yesterday eight or ten acres of open water at the west end of Walden, where is depth and breadth combined"); December 31, 1850 ("Walden pond has frozen over since I was there last."); December 31, 1853 ("Walden froze completely over last night. It is, however, all snow ice, as it froze while it was snowing hard, and it looks like frozen yeast somewhat.”)

Thursday. December 20 It is in the 40s we go out after sunset and take one of those new routes off the rocky trail. The one with the steep climb through rock garden of moss and ferns. The moon will not be full for a couple of days and is concealed by clouds. With the snow cover it is light enough to walk without headlamp (except we use the red light) I read later from Henry’s journal of August 5, 1851“When the moon is on the increase and half full it is already in mid-heaven at sunset so that there is no marked twilight intervening”  and December 10, 1856("The nights are light on account of the snow, and, there being a moon, there is no distinct interval between the day and night.") This seems to be the case tonight. I sit on the bench and look out over the lights in the valley. There is a forecast for rain in 88 minutes so we do not linger, walking back down along the edges of the rocky trail in the crusty snow then heading north to cross the stream and back along the ridge and out.  It begins to rain lightly. ~ zphx 20181220 

Walden is about one-third skimmed over.

December 11. 

P. M. — To Walden. 

An overcast afternoon and rather warm. The snow on the ground in pastures brings out the warm red in leafy oak woodlands by contrast. These are what Thomson calls “the tawny copse.” So that they suggest both shelter and warmth. All browns, indeed, are warmer now than a week ago. These oak woodlands half a mile off, commonly with pines intermingled, look like warm coverts for birds and other wild animals. How much warmer our woodlands look and are for these withered leaves that still hang on! Without them the woods would be dreary, bleak, and wintry indeed.  Here is a manifest provision for the necessities of man and the brutes. These leaves remain to keep us warm, and to keep the earth warm about their roots. 

While the oak leaves look redder and warmer, the pines look much darker since the snow has fallen (the hemlocks darker still). A mile or two distant they are dark brown, or almost black, as, still further, is all woodland, and in the most distant horizon have a blue tinge like mountains, from the atmosphere. The boughs of old and bare oak woods are gray and in harmony with the white ground, looking as if snowed on. 

Already, in hollows in the woods and on the sheltered sides of hills, the fallen leaves are collected in small heaps on the snow-crust, simulating bare ground and helping to conceal the rabbit and partridge, etc. They are not equally diffused, but collected together here and there as if for the sake of society. 

I find at the Pout’s Nest, now quite frozen over, air-holes and all, twenty-two pollywogs frozen in and dead within a space of two and a half feet square, also a minnow — apparently a young shiner, but it has a dark longitudinal line along side (about an inch and a half long)—with the bream.

The terminal shoots of the small scarlet oaks are still distinctly red, though withered. 

A “swirl,” applied to leaves suddenly caught up by a sort of whirlwind, is a good word enough, methinks. 

Walden is about one-third skimmed over. It is frozen  nearly half the way out from the northerly shore, excepting a very broad open space on the northwest shore and a considerable space at the pines at the northeast end; but the ice, thin as it is, extends quite across from the northwest side to the southwest cape (west side of the railroad bay) by an isthmus only two or three rods wide in its narrowest part. 

It is evident that whether a pond shall freeze this side or that first depends much on the wind. If it is small and lies like Walden between hills, I should expect that in perfectly calm weather it would freeze soonest along the south shore, but in this case there was probably wind from the north or northwest, and the more sheltered and smooth north side froze first.

The warmth reflected from the pines at the northeast corner may account for the open water there, but I can not account for the open space of the northwest end. [It must be because it is there open to the rake of the north Wind. the shore being flat and gently sloping backward a long way, while the protection of Heywood‘s Peak may account for the ice isthmus being met by the break-wind of the west railroad cape.]

It is remarkable that the south edge of the ice projects southward in a cape corresponding to the deep triangular bay in the south side, though it is in the middle of the pond, and there is even a rude correspondence else where along the edge of the ice to the opposite shore.  This might seem to indicate that the ice to some extent formed first over deepest water. 

When the ice was melting and the trees dripping, on the morning of the 6th, I noticed that the snow was discolored, — stained yellow by this drip, — as if the trees were urinating. 

The large scarlet oak in the cemetery has leaves on the lower limbs near the trunk just like the large white oaks now. So has the largest black oak which I see. Others of both, and all, kinds are bare. 

Some, being offended, think sharp and satirical things, which yet they are not prepared consciously to utter. But in some unguarded moment these things escape from them, when they are as it were unconscious. They betray their thoughts, as it were by talking in their sleep, for the truth will out, under whatever veil of civility.

H.D. Thoreau, Journal, December 11, 1858

Already, in hollows in the woods and on the sheltered sides of hills, the fallen leaves are collected in small heaps on the snow-crust. See December 9, 1856 ("Coming through the Walden woods, I see already great heaps of oak leaves collected in certain places on the snow-crust by the roadside, where an eddy deposited them."); January 28, 1857 ("Notice many heaps of leaves on snow on the hillside southwest of the pond, as usual.");  February 4, 1856 ("The oak leaves which have blown over the snow are collected in dense heaps on the still side of the bays at Walden, where I suspect they make warm beds for the rabbits to squat on.").. Also  January 7, 1857 ("Though the rest of the broad path is else perfectly unspotted white, each track of the fox has proved a trap which has caught from three or four to eight or ten leaves each."); January 8, 1852 ("almost every track which I made yesterday in the snow - perhaps ten inches deep - has got a dead leaf in it, though none is to be seen on the snow around.")

Walden is about one-third skimmed over. See December 9, 1856 ("There is scarcely a particle of ice in Walden yet, and that close to the edge, apparently, on the west and northwest sides. . . .This is, no doubt, owing solely to the greater depth of Walden."); December 19,1856 ("Walden froze completely over last night.This is very sudden, for on the evening of the 15th there was not a particle of ice in it. In just three days, then, it has been completely frozen over, and the ice is now from two and a half to three inches thick, a transparent green ice, through which I see the bottom where it is seven or eight feet deep."); December 20, 1858 (“Walden is frozen over, except two small spots, less than half an acre in all, in middle.”) December 21, 1855 (“Walden is skimmed over, all but an acre, in my cove.”); December 21, 1854 (“Walden is frozen over, apparently about two inches thick.”)


It is evident that whether a pond shall freeze this side or that first depends much on the wind. See December 29, 1855 ("Am surprised to find eight or ten acres of Walden still open, notwithstanding the cold of the 26th, 27th, and 28th and of to-day. It must be owing to the wind partly."); December 30, 1853 ("The pond [Walden] not yet frozen entirely over; about six acres open, the wind blew so hard last night.");

Fair Haven Pond completely frozen over during the last four days.

November 18. 

November 18, 2018

P. M. — To Conantum. 

Notice the short bright-yellow willow twigs on Hubbard’s Causeway. They are prominent now, first, because they are bare; second, because high-colored always and this rarity of bright colors at present; third, because of the clear air and November light. 

For the same reason I notice nowadays the red twigs of the silky cornel by the river. The black willow twigs are tawny in the mass, almost cinnamon. 

The fruitless enterprise of some persons who rush helter-skelter, carrying out their crazy scheme,—merely “putting it through,” as they phrase it, — reminds me of those thistle-downs which, not being detained nor steadied by any seed at the base, are blown away at the first impulse and go rolling over all obstacles. They may indeed go fastest and farthest, but where they rest at last not even a thistle springs. I meet these useless barren thistle-downs driving over the fields. They remind me of busy merchants and brokers on ’change doing business on credit, gambling with fancy stocks, that have failed over and over again, assisted to get a-going again to no purpose,—-a great ado about no thing, — all in my eye, — with nothing to deposit, not of the slightest use to the great thistle tribe, not even tempting a jackass. When you right or extricate one of these fellows and set him before the wind again, it is worth the while to look and see if he has any seed of success under him. Such a one you may know afar — he floats more slowly and steadily— and of his enterprise expect results. 

Am surprised to see Fair Haven Pond completely frozen over during the last four days. It will probably open again. Thus, while all the channel elsewhere is open and a mere edging of ice amid the weeds is seen, this great expansion is completely bridged over, thus early. 

Some mocker-nuts, and I think some hickories, on Conantum are not yet bare. Their withered leaves hold on almost like the oaks. Now is the time to gather the mocker-nuts. 

I go along under the east side of Lee’s Cliff, looking at the evergreen ferns. The marginal fern is the commonest. How pretty the smallest asplenium sometimes, in a recess under a shelving rock, as it were pinned on rosettewise, as if it were the head of a breastpin. 

I look south from the Cliff. The westering sun just out of sight behind the hill. Its rays from those bare twigs across the pond are bread and cheese to me. So many oak leaves have fallen that the white birch stems are more distinct amid the young oaks; I see to the bone. See those brave birches prepared to stand the Winter through on the hillsides. They never sing, “What’s this dull town to me?” 

The maples skirting the meadows (in dense phalanxes) look like light infantry advanced for a swamp fight. Ah, dear November, ye must be sacred to the Nine surely.

The early willow catkins already peep out a quarter of an inch. 

Early crowfoot is reddened at Lee’s.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, November 18, 1858

Notice the short bright-yellow willow twigs on Hubbard’s Causeway. Compare November 18, 1855 (“I do not detect any peculiar brightness whatever in the osiers on the Hubbard causeway; they are scarcely, if at all, brighter than the tops of the trees.”)

Am surprised to see Fair Haven Pond completely frozen over.  See November 21, 1852 ("I am surprised this afternoon to find . . . Fair Haven Pond one-third frozen or skimmed over, though commonly there is scarcely any ice to be observed along the shores."); November 23, 1852 (“I am surprised to see Fair Haven entirely skimmed over.”) December 5, 1853 (" Fair Haven Pond is skimmed completely over."); December 7, 1856 (" Take my first skate to Fair Haven Pond”)

Now is the time to gather the mocker-nuts. See November 7, 1853 (“I shook two mocker-nut trees; one just ready to drop its nuts, and most came out of the shells. But the other tree was not ready; only a part fell, and those mostly in the shells.”); November 19, 1858 ("I shook the trees. It is just the time to get them")

How pretty the smallest asplenium sometimes, in a recess under a shelving rock, as it were pinned on rosettewise, as if it were the head of a breastpin. See August 30, 1853 ("The dwarf spleenwort [maidenhair spleenwort] grows in the sharp angles of the rocks in the side of Lee's Cliff, its small fronds spreading in curved rays . . . The ebony spleenwort stands upright against the rocks.")

The early willow catkins already peep out a quarter of an inch. See February 19, 1857 (“Some willow catkins have crept a quarter of an inch from under their scales and look very red, probably on account of the warm weather.”); March 10, 1855 (“I am not aware of growth in any plant yet, unless it be the further peeping out of willow catkins. They have crept out further from under their scales, and, looking closely into them, I detect a little redness along the twigs even now”): 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.”)