Acorns sprouting

May 29.

Thorn bushes and the Ranunculus bulbosus are apparently in prime.

Coming out of Sleepy Hollow Cemetery today, where I had just been to deposit the corpse of a man, I pick up an oak tree three inches high with the acorn attached.

The republican swallow at Hosmer's barn just begun to lay.


H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 29, 1859

The Ranunculus bulbosus are apparently in prime. See May 29, 1857 ("Ranunculus bulbosus in bloom."); May 17, 1856 ("Ranunculus bulbosils a day or two at least.")

An oak tree three inches high. See May 12, 1859 ("My red oak acorns have sent down long radicles underground.”)

The wood pewee arrives on time.

Last night the eastern wood pewee was not heard, but tonight it was peeweeing in the creeping darkness of the evening.
Spring is coming to an end and the thickness of summer will soon take its place.


Avesong, May 24, 2009

Hear the wood pewee

May 24.

What is that brilliant warbler on the young trees on the side of the Deep Cut? Orange throat and beneath, with distinct black stripes on breast, and, I think, some light color of crown. Was it Blackburnian?

Hear the wood pewee.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 24, 1859

Orange throat and beneath, with distinct black stripes on breast, and, I think, some light color of crown. Was it Blackburnian? See April 11, 1853 ("Blackburnian is orange-throated."); May 26, 1855 ("Black, with a large white mark forward on wings and a fiery orange throat, above and below eye, and line on crown, yellowish beneath, white vent, forked tail, dusky legs and bill . . .The Blackbumian warbler very plainly.")

Hear the wood pewee. See note to May 24,1860 ("Hear a wood pewee.")

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

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 © 2009-2021

A walk in the woods, May 22, 2009

This evening Jane asks me to go for a walk in the woods. What a privilege. She is always finding things. "Because i have to look down all the time."

Several sets of coyote scat. Interesting plants. Snails.

Then, "Something was killed here." And, looking down, I see one black and white feather, then more.

"Pileated," she says, "look for the beak." She finds it. A partial skull, red feathers still attached, with powerful beak. She finds a tail feather and shows me its stiffness.

On we hike to the upper trail, bushwack over the ridge to the wetland near our southeast corner, then up the old road in the ravine and finally sit on the mossy overlook on top of the ridge. Blueberries flowering here.

Getting down is a little rough. Too steep near the upper pond. Getting dark, we backtrack and come out on the trail. I stop at the lower view to take a picture of the sunset.

At home after dark: Bats!

Zphx

Life out of doors begins.

May 4.

I, sailing in the spring ocean, 
getting in from my winter voyage,
begin to smell the land.

I draw near to the land; 
I begin to lie down and 
stretch myself on it. 

After my winter voyage 
I begin to smell the land.

H.D. Thoreau, Journal, May 4, 1859

After my winter voyage I begin to smell the land. See note to March 4, 1854 ("I begin to sniff the air and smell the ground.")

I, sailing in the spring ocean, getting in from my winter voyage, begin to smell the land. Such a scent perceived by a mariner would be very exciting. I not only smell the land breeze, but I perceive in it the fragrance of spring flowers. I draw near to the land; I begin to lie down and stretch my self on it. After my winter voyage I begin to smell the land.

This moment

Admiring you
asleep on my arm
you open your eyes
and give me a smile
that lasts all these years.

Zphx

This morning

Thinking of you this morning
a phoebe lands at my side

says her name
and flies away.


Zphx

Dark woods

I just did a quick loop around and back through the woods, it took about 20 minutes and I forgot to put my boots on, and it was cool and the light was fading quickly, and the last notes of the hermit thrushes rang though the forest around me, and I wasn't afraid, I felt confident and clear-minded and I regret it was too late to go on further.

Avesong, April 29,2009

The flight of the leaves.

As we sat on the steep hillside south of Nut Meadow Brook Crossing, we noticed a remarkable whirlwind on a small scale, which carried up the oak leaves from that Island copse in the meadow.

The oak leaves now hang thinly and are very dry and light, and these small whirlwinds, which seem to be occasioned by the sudden hot and calm weather (like whirlpools or dimples in a smooth stream), wrench them off, and up they go, somewhat spirally, in countless flocks like birds, with a rustling sound; and higher and higher into the clear blue deeps they rise above our heads, till they are fairly lost to sight, looking, when last seen, mere light specks against the blue, like stars by day, in fact.

I could distinguish some, I have no doubt, five or six hundred feet high at least, but if I looked aside a moment they were lost.I had never observed this phenomenon so remarkable. This was quite local. Thousands went up together in a rustling flock, -- to descend where?

The flight of the leaves.


H.D. Thoreau, Journal, May 1, 1859

As we sat on the steep hillside south of Nut Meadow Brook Crossing, we noticed a remarkable whirlwind. See April 7, 1860 ("As we were ascending the hill in the road beyond College Meadow, we saw . . . a small whirlwind. . .taking up a large body of withered leaves beneath it, which were whirled about with a great rustling and carried forward with it into the meadow, frightening some hens there.”); December 11, 1858 ("A “swirl,” applied to leaves suddenly caught up by a sort of whirlwind, is a good word enough, methinks.")