A pleasant day

December 4.

A pleasant day and yet no snow nor ice. 

The younger osiers on Shattuck’s row do shine.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 4, 1855

December 4. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, December 4; A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, I love you like I love the sky

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 stubble and numerous withered weeds rising above the snow.

November 18

About an inch of snow fell last night, but the ground was not at all frozen or prepared for it. A little greener grass and stubble here and there seems to burn its way through it this forenoon. 

As I sit in the house, I am struck with the brightness and heat of the sun reflected from this our first snow. There is an intenser light in the house, and I feel an uncommon heat from the sun’s rays on my back. 

It clears up at noon, and at 2 P. M. I go to Fair Haven Hill via Hubbard’s Grove. The air is very clear, and the sky heavenly, with a few floating downy clouds. 

I am prepared to hear sharp, screaming notes rending the air, from the winter birds. I do, in fact, hear many jays, and the tinkling, like rattling glass, from chickadees and tree sparrows. 

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.

Now first mark the stubble and numerous withered weeds rising above the snow. They have suddenly acquired a new character. 

Yarrow

Tansy still shows its yellow disks, but yarrow is particularly fresh and perfect, cold and chaste, with its pretty little dry-looking rounded white petals and green leaves. Its very color gives it a right to bloom above the snow, —as level as a snow-crust on the top white ruff. 

The snow is the great track-revealer. I come across the tracks of persons who, at a different hour from myself, have crossed, and perhaps often cross, some remote field on their errands, when I had not suspected a predecessor; and the track of the dog or staff are seen too. The cattle have tracked their whole pasture over, as if there had been a thousand. I have this silent but unerring evidence of any who have crossed the fields since last night. It is pleasant to see tracks leading towards the woods, - to be reminded that any have engagements there. 

Yet for the most part the snow is quite untrodden. Most fields have no track of man in them. I only see where a squirrel has leaped from the wall. 

The perfectly leafless alder thickets are much darker than the maples, now that the ground is whitened. The pasture directly under my face is white, but, seen aslant a few rods off, mostly russet. 

I was so warmed in spirit in getting my wood that the heat it finally yielded when burnt was coldness in comparison. That first is a warmth which you cannot buy. 

Gather a bagful of fair apples on Fair Haven, showing their red cheeks above the snow. These apples which I get nowadays —russets and Baldwins — are the ripest of all, being acted on by the frost and partly left because they were slightly over ripe for keeping. I come home with a heavy bagful and rob no one. 

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, November 18, 1855

The snow is the great track-revealer. See December 4, 1856 ("How many thousand acres are there now of pitchered blue-curls and ragged wormwood rising above the shallow snow? . . .the first snow comes and reveals them.") December 8, 1855 ("Let a snow come and clothe the ground and trees, and I shall see the tracks of many inhabitants now unsuspected"); December 12, 1859 ("The snow having come, we see where is the path of the partridge, — his comings and goings from copse to copse, — and now first, as it were, we have the fox for our nightly neighbor, and countless tiny deer mice."); December 22, 1852 ("The squirrel, rabbit, fox tracks, etc., attract the attention in the new-fallen snow . . . You cannot go out so early but you will find the track of some wild creature."): December 31, 1853 ("This animal probably I should never see the least trace of, were it not for the snow, the great revealer."); January 4, 1860 ("Again see what the snow reveals . . . that the woods are nightly thronged with little creatures which most have never seen"); January 5, 1860 ("How much the snow reveals!"); February 16, 1854 ("Snow is a great revealer not only of tracks made in itself, but even in the earth before it fell.")

I do not detect any peculiar brightness whatever in the osiers. See November 18, 1858 ("Notice the short bright-yellow willow twigs on Hubbard’s Causeway.") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau,  the Osier in Winter and early Spring

Now first mark the stubble and numerous withered weeds rising above the snow. See December 26,1853 ("All weeds, with their seeds, rising dark above the snow, are now remarkably conspicuous, which before were not observed against the dark earth.”) See note to November 29, 1856 ("Begins to snow this morning and snows slowly and interruptedly with a little fine hail all day till it is several inches deep. This the first snow I have seen.")

Tansy still shows its yellow disks, but yarrow is particularly fresh and perfect, cold and chaste. See November 18, 1852 ("Yarrow and tansy still. These are cold, gray days.”); See also  November 3, 1853 ("To-day I see yarrow, very bright"); ; November 22, 1853 ("Yarrow is particularly fresh and innocent") and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Yarrow and Tansy in Autumn

November 18. See A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, November 18

Rounded white petals 

of yarrow above the snow –

perfect, cold and chaste.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, 

The stubble and numerous withered weeds rising above the snow. 

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 ©  2009-2025

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-551118

A little duck in the middle of the Pond.

April 19

5 A. M. — Up Assabet. 

Warm and still and somewhat cloudy. Am without greatcoat. 

The guns are firing and bells ringing. 

I hear a faint honk and, looking up, see going over the river, within fifty rods, thirty-two geese in the form of a hay-hook, only two in the hook, and they are at least six feet apart. Probably the whole line is twelve rods long. 

At least three hundred have passed over Concord, or rather within the breadth of a mile, this spring (perhaps twice as many); for I have seen or heard of a dozen flocks, and the two I counted had about thirty each. 

Many tortoises have their heads out. The river has fallen a little. Going up the Assabet, two or three tortoises roll down the steep bank with a rustle. One tumbles on its edge and rolls swiftly like a disk cast by a boy, with its back to me, from eight or ten feet into the water. 

I hear no concert of tree sparrows. Hear the tull-lull of the white-throated sparrow in street, and the jingle of the chip-bird. 

This forenoon, sit with open window. Now plowing and planting will begin generally. 

P. M. — To Walden.

Some golden willows will now just peel fairly, though on this one the buds have not started.  (Another sudden change in the wind to northeast and a freshness with some mist from the sea at 3.30 P. M.) These osiers to my eye have only a little more liquid green than a month ago. 

A shad frog on the dry grass. The wild red cherry will begin to leaf to-morrow. 

From Heywood’s Peak I think I see the head of a loon in the pond, thirty-five or forty rods distant. Bringing my glass to bear, it seems sunk very low in the water, — all the neck concealed, — but I can not tell which end was the bill. 

At length I discover that it is the whole body of a little duck, asleep with its head in its back, exactly in the middle of the pond. 

It has a moderate-sized black head and neck, a white breast, and seems dark-brown above, with a white spot on the side of the head, not reaching to the out side, from base of mandibles, and another, perhaps, on the end of the wing, with some black there. 

It sits drifting round a little, but with ever its breast toward the wind, and from time to time it raises its head and looks round to see if it is safe. 

I think it is the smallest duck I ever saw. Floating buoyantly asleep on the middle of Walden Pond. 

Is it not a female of the buffle-headed or spirit duck?

I believed the wings looked blacker when it flew, with some white beneath. It floated like a little casket, and at first I doubted a good while if it possessed life, until I saw it raise its head and look around. It chose a place for its nap exactly equidistant between the two shores there, and, with its breast to the wind, swung round only as much as a vessel held by its anchors in the stream. At length the cars scared it. 

Goodwin caught twenty-five pouts and one shiner at the Walden meadow, but no perch. 

Slippery elm in tumbler to-day; probably to-morrow at Cliffs.

A partridge drums.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 19, 1855

The guns are firing and bells ringing. See April 19, 1852 ("The guns were fired and the bells rung to commemorate the anniversary of the birth of a nation's liberty. ")

At least three hundred have passed over Concord this spring. See April 19, 1852 ("How many there must be, that one or more flocks are seen to go over almost every farm in New England in the spring.”) See also April 8, 1855 (“This evening, about 9 P.M., I hear geese go over, now there in the south, now southeast, now east, now northeast, low over the village, but not seen. The first I have heard.”); April 9, 1855 ("Several flocks of geese went over this morning also. Now, then, the main body are moving. Now first are they generally seen and heard.”); April 17, 1855 ("Geese go over at noon, when warm and sunny. “); Also see A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau: Signs of Spring, Geese Overhead

A little duck, asleep with its head in its back, exactly in the middle of the pond.  See March 21, 1854 ("Look with glass and find more than thirty black ducks asleep with their heads in their backs, motionless, and thin ice formed about them."); March 31, 1858 ("I see about a dozen black ducks on Flint's Pond, asleep with their heads in their backs and drifting across the pond before the wind.")

Buffle headed or spirit duck. See January 7, 1853 ("He shows me the spirit duck of the Indians, of which Peabody says the Indians call it by a word meaning spirit, "because of the wonderful quickness with which it disappears at the twang of a bow." "); April 22, 1861 (" [Mann]obtained to-day the buffle-headed duck, diving in the river near the Nine-Acre Corner bridge. I identify it at sight as my bird seen on Walden. ") See also J J Audubon (The bufflehead, being known in different districts by the names of Spirit Duck, Butter-box, Marrionette, Dipper, and Die-dipper,") Compare December 14, 1854 ("At our old bathing-place on the Assabet, saw two ducks, which at length took to wing. They had large dark heads, dark wings, and clear white breasts. I think they were buffle-headed or spirit ducks. ") December 26, 1853 ("Saw in [Walden] a small diver, probably a grebe or dobchick, dipper, or what-not, ... It had a black head, a white ring about its neck, a white breast, black back, and apparently no tail.”); September 27, 1860 ("[The little dipper] has a dark bill and considerable white on the sides of the head or neck, with black between it, no tufts, and no observable white on back or tail.") See alsoA Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Little Dipper

Some golden willows will now just peel fairly. See April 19, 1853 ("Willow and bass strip freely."); see also April 9, 1855 ("The golden willow is, methinks, a little livelier green and begins to peel a little"); April 18, 1860 ("The Salix discolor peels well; also the aspen (early) has begun to peel.")

These osiers to my eye have only a little more liquid green than a month ago.  See February 24, 1855 ("You will often fancy that they look brighter before the spring has come, and when there has been no change in them"); March 24, 1855 (" I am not sure that the osiers are decidedly brighter yet"); See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Osier in Winter and early Spring

Another sudden change in the wind to northeast and a freshness with some mist from the sea at 3.30 P. M. See April 18, 1855 ("I see suddenly all the southern horizon . . full of a mist, like a dust, already concealing the Lincoln hills and producing distinct wreaths of vapor, the rest of the horizon being clear. Evidently a sea-turn, — a wind from over the sea, condensing the moisture in our warm atmosphere and putting another aspect on the face of things."); April 29, 1856 (" about 3 P. M. I felt a fresh easterly wind, and saw quite a mist in the distance produced by it, a sea-turn. . . .. Your first warning of it may be the seeing a thick mist on all the hills and in the horizon. "); April 30, 1856 ("at one o’clock there was the usual fresh easterly wind and sea-turn . . .and a fresh cool wind from the sea produces a mist in the air.")

A partridge drums. See April 19, 1860 ('"You will hear at first a single beat or two far apart and have time to say, "There is a partridge," so distinct and deliberate is it often, before it becomes a rapid roll."); See also April 25, 1854 ("The first partridge drums in one or two places, as if the earth's pulse now beat audibly with the increased flow of life.”). and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau  The Partridge.

April 19, 2015

Little duck asleep

in the middle of the pond –

its head in its back 

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, A little duck in the middle of the Pond

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 © 2009-2025

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-550419

High winds and wintry cold.

April 2.

Not only the grass but the pines also were greener yesterday for being wet.  To-day, the grass being dry, the green blades are less conspicuous than yesterday. It would seem, then, that this color is more vivid when wet, and perhaps all green plants, like lichens, are to some extent greener in moist weather. 

Green is essentially vivid, or the color of life, and it is therefore most brilliant when a plant is moist or most alive. A plant is said to be green in opposition to being withered and dead. The word, according to Webster, is from the Saxon grene, to grow, and hence is the color of herbage when growing. 

High winds all night, rocking the house, opening doors, etc. To-day also. It is wintry cold also, and ice has formed nearly an inch thick in my boat. 

P. M. — Down the river-bank. 

The wind is still very strong and cold from the north west, filling the air with dust and blowing the water, which has slightly risen, over the rocks and bushes along the shore, where it freezes in the shape of bulls’ horns about the osiers, making coarse rakes with its dependent icicles when the osiers are horizontal, also turtle-shells over the rocks. 

It is just such a wind and freezing as that of last March (18th, I think), and, if the meadow were flooded, there would probably be as much ice as then on the bushes. There may be wind enough for this phenomenon in the winter, but then there is no open water to be blown.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 2, 1855

Not only the grass but the pines also were greener yesterday for being wet. See April 1, 1855 ("When I look out the window I see that the grass on the bank on the south side of the house is already much greener than it was yesterday."); March 30, 1855 ("There is a very perceptible greenness on our south bank now"). See also December 28, 1851 ("The white pines look greener than usual in this gentle rain,");  May 11, 1854 ("Not only the wet grass looks many shades greener in the twilight, but the old pine-needles also.")

Green is essentially vivid, or the color of life, and it is therefore most brilliant when a plant is moist or most alive. See April 24, 1859  ("I am struck by the vivid greenness of the tips of the sedge just pushing up out of its dry tussocks in the water . . . this vivid green  . . .  is the renewal of life."); October 12, 1859 ("The dendroideum and lucidulum, etc., — how vivid a green ! — lifting their heads above the moist fallen leaves.")

High winds all night, rocking the house, opening doors. See February 29, 1852 (“High winds . . . The house shakes, and the beds and tables rock.”); March 6, 1855 (" Still stronger wind, shaking the house."); March 18, 1854 ("Very high wind this forenoon . . . Never felt it shake the house so much."); June 2, 1855 (“The wind shakes the house night and day.”)

Ice has formed nearly an inch thick in my boat.  See March 19, 1855 ("A fine clear and warm day for the season. Launched my boat."); March 20, 1855 ("A flurry of snow at 7 A. M. I go to turn my boat up.”);Compare November 24, 1853 ("Ice forms in my boat.”); November 24, 1855 ("Ice has frozen pretty thick in the bottom of my boat.”): November 26, 1855 ("Bottom of boat covered with ice.")

April 3. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, April 2

It is wintry cold

and ice has formed in my boat –

nearly an inch thick.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, High winds and wintry cold.

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 © 2009-2025

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-550402

The brightening of the willows or of osiers, —that is a season in the spring

February 24

Clear, but very cold and windy for the season. 

P. M. -To young willow-row near Hunt’s Pond road. 

The whole of the broad meadows is a rough, irregular checker-board of great cakes a rod square or more,—arctic enough to look at. 

The willow-row does not begin to look bright yet. The top two or three feet are red as usual at a distance, the lower parts a rather dull green. 

February 24, 2018

The brightening of the willows or of osiers, —that is a season in the spring, showing that the dormant sap is awakened. I now remember a few osiers which I have seen early in past springs, thus brilliantly green and red (or yellow), and it is as if all the landscape and all nature shone. Though the twigs were few which I saw, I remember it as a prominent phenomenon affecting the face of Nature, a gladdening of her face. 

You will often fancy that they look brighter before the spring has come, and when there has been no change in them.

Thermometer at 10° at 10 P. M.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, February 24, 1855

Clear, but very cold and windy for the season . . .Thermometer at 10° at 10 P. M. See February 26, 1855 ("Still clear and cold and windy . . .This and the last two or three days have been very blustering and unpleasant,") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, February is Mid-Winter

The whole of the broad meadows is a rough, irregular checker-board of great cakes a rod square or more,—arctic enough to look at. See February 23, 1855 ("I see great cakes of ice, a rod or more in length and one foot thick, lying high and dry on the bare ground in the low fields some ten feet or more beyond the edge of the thinner ice, washed up by the last rise (the 18th).”)

The brightening of the willows or of osiers, —that is a season in the spring. See  February 24, 1852 ("The brightness of the willow's bark. It is a natural resurrection, an experience of immortality.");  See also  November 18, 1858 ("Notice the short bright-yellow willow twigs on Hubbard’s Causeway"); December 5, 1858 (" On the causeway the yellowish bark of the willows gleams warmly through the ice."); March 2, 1860 ('Notice the brightness of a row of osiers this morning. ");  March 20, 1859 ("A rich yellow or orange yellow in the upper three or four feet. This is, methinks, the brightest object in the landscape these days. Nothing so betrays the spring sun. I am aware that the sun has come out of a cloud first by seeing it lighting up the osiers. Such a willow-row, cut off within a year or two, might be called a heliometer, or measure of the sun's brightness"); May 14, 1852 ("Going over the Corner causeway, the willow blossoms fill the air with a sweet fragrance, and I am ready to sing, Ah! willow, willow! These willows have yellow bark, bear yellow flowers and yellowish-green leaves, and are now haunted by the summer yellowbird and Maryland yellow-throat") and A Book of Seasons, by Henry Thoreau. Willows on the Causeway; A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Osier in Winter and early Spring

You will often fancy that they look brighter before the spring has come, and when there has been no change in them. See March 2, 1860 ("This phenomenon, whether referable to a change in the condition of the twig or to the spring air and light, or even to our imaginations, is not the less a real phenomenon, affecting us annually at this season")

February 24. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, February 24

Brightening willows.

That is a season in spring -

even if fancied.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The brightening of the willows or of osiers

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/hdt55-0224

Cold and windy – osiers surprise me.

March 25

Cold and windy.

Down river in boat to Great Meadows. Freezes on oars. Too cold and windy almost for ducks. They are in the smoother open water (free from ice) under the lee of hills.

March 25, 2017

Got a boat-load of driftwood, — rails, bridge timber, planks, etc.

White maple buds bursting, making trees look like some fruit trees with blossom-buds.

Is not the small duck or two I see one at a time and flying pretty high a teal?

Willow osiers near Mill Brook mouth I am almost certain have acquired a fresher color; at least they surprise me at a distance by their green passing through yellowish to red at top.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, March 25, 1854

Too cold and windy almost for ducks. They are in the smoother open water (free from ice) under the lee of hills. See  March 21, 1854 ("At sunrise to Clamshell Hill . . .Think I should find ducks cornered up by the ice; they get behind this hill for shelter. Look with glass and find more than thirty black ducks asleep with their heads on their backs, motionless, and thin ice formed about them. ");March 22, 1854 ("Still very cold . . . Scare up my flock of black ducks and count forty together. ");.March 24, 1854 ("The same ducks under Clamshell Hill "); March 25, 1858 ("Cold northwest wind as yesterday and day before . . .There are so many sportsmen out that the ducks have no rest); and see March 28, 1858 ("Apparently they improve this warm and pleasant day, with little or no wind, to continue their journey northward.. . . It is a wildlife that is associated with stormy and blustering weather"); .March 29, 1858 ("I infer that waterfowl travel in pleasant weather") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the American Black Duck

White maple buds bursting, making trees look like some fruit trees with blossom-buds. See March 23, 1853 (“The white maple . . . has opened unexpectedly, and a rich sight it is, looking up through the expanded buds to the sky.”) See also  A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, White Maple Buds and Flowers

Is not the small duck or two I see one at a time and flying pretty high a teal? See March 18, 1855 ("Meanwhile a small dark-colored duck, all neck and wings, a winged rolling-pin, went over,--perhaps a teal"); March 24, 1857 ("Humphrey Buttrick . . . shot three black ducks and two green-winged teal, – though the latter had no green on their wings, it was rather the color of his boat, but Wesson assured him that so they looked in the spring. "); April 15, 1855 ("We scare up but few ducks — some apparently black, which quacked—and some small rolling-pins, probably teal.")

I am almost certain osiers have acquired a fresher color. See February 24, 1855 ("You will often fancy that they look brighter before the spring has come, and when there has been no change in them"); March 2, 1860 ("This phenomenon, whether referable to a change in the condition of the twig or to the spring air and light, or even to our imaginations,is not the less a real phenomenon, affecting us annually at this season"); March 14, 1856 ("They certainly look brighter now and from this point than I have noticed them before this year,. . . Yet I think that on a close inspection I should find no change. Nevertheless, it is, on the whole, perhaps the most springlike sight I have seen."); March 16, 1856 ("There is, at any rate, such a phenomenon as the willows shining in the spring sun, however it is to be accounted for."); March 22, 1854("C. thinks some willow osiers decidedly more yellow."); March 24, 1855 ("I am not sure that the osiers are decidedly brighter yet"). See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Osier in Winter and early Spring

Willow osiers

surprise me at a distance –

green yellowish red!

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Willow Osiers Surprise Me

 "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-540325

Hemp still in blossom.

August 28. 

August 28, 2012

Now the red osier berries are very handsome along the river, overhanging the water, for the most part pale blue mixed with whitish, -- part of the pendant jewelry of the season. The berries of the alternate leaved cornel have dropped off mostly. The white-berried and red osier are in their prime. The other three kinds I have not seen. 

The viburnums, dentatum and nudum, are in their prime. The sweet viburnum not yet purple, and the maple-leaved still yellowish.

Hemp still in blossom.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, August 28, 1852

Now the red osier berries are very handsome along the river. . . See August 28, 1856 ("The bright china-colored blue berries of the Cornus sericea begin to show themselves along the river. .”)

The viburnums, dentatum and nudum, are in their prime. See August 28, 1856 (" Viburnum nudum berries are beginning; I already see a few shrivelled purple ones amid the light green. "); see also August 31, 1856 ("The Viburnum nudum berries are now in prime, a handsome rose-purple."); September 3, 1856 ("Gather four or five quarts of Viburnum nudum berries, now in their prime, attracted more by the beauty of the cymes than the flavor of the fruit. The berries, which are of various sizes and forms, — elliptical, oblong, or globular, — are in different stages of maturity on the same cyme, and so of different colors, — green or white, rose-colored, and dark purple or black, — i. e. three or four very distinct and marked colors, side by side. . . . Remarkable for passing through so many stages of color before they arrive at maturity.")