Umbrella weather, expecting geese.

March 10.

March 10. Misty rain, rain, the third day of more or less rain. 

P. M.-  C. Miles road via Clamshell Hill . Misty and mizzling. 

The radical leaves of the shepherd's-purse are common and fresh, also that early thistle by Nut Meadow Brook, with much down webbed, holding the mist in drops. 

Each alder catkin has a clear drop at the end, though the air is filled with mist merely, which from time to time is blown in my face and I put up my umbrella. 

The bæomyces is very perfect and handsome to-day. 

It occurs to me that heavy rains and sudden meltings of the snow, such as we had a fortnight ago (February 26th), before the ground is thawed, so that all the water, instead of being soaked up by the ground, flows rapidly into the streams and ponds, is necessary to swell and break them up. If we waited for the direct influence of the sun on the ice and the influence of such water as would reach the river under other circumstances, the spring would be very much delayed. 

In the violent freshet there is a mechanic force added to the chemic.

The willow catkins on the Miles [road] I should say had decidedly started since I was here last, and are all peeping from under their scales conspicuously. 

At present I should say that the vegetable kingdom showed the influence of the spring as much in the air as in the water, that is, in the flowing of the sap, the skunk-cabbage buds, and the swelling of the willow catkins. 

I have detected very little, if anything, starting in brooks or ditches, for the first have far overflowed their banks and [are] full of rapid and sandy water, and the latter are still frequently full of ice. But probably that depends on the year, whether open or not. 
 
The weather is almost April-like.  We always have much of this rainy, drizzling, misty weather in early spring, after which we expect to hear geese.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, March 10, 1854

The flowing of the sap, the skunk-cabbage buds, and the swelling of the willow catkins . . . Each alder catkin has a clear drop at the end / the willow catkins are all peeping from under their scales conspicuously.  See March 10, 1853 ("Methinks the first obvious evidence of spring is the pushing out of the swamp willow catkins, then the relaxing of the earlier alder catkins, then the pushing up of skunk-cabbage spathes (and pads at the bottom of water)."); See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Signs of the Spring: Alder and Willow Catkins Expanding; A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Signs of Spring: the Skunk Cabbage

We always have much of this rainy, drizzling, misty weather in early spring, after which we expect to hear geese. See March 14, 1854 ("From within the house at 5.30 p. m. I hear the loud honking of geese, throw up the window, and see a large flock in disordered harrow flying more directly north or even northwest than usual. Raw, thick, misty weather.”). See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Signs of the Spring; Geese Overhead

March 10.  See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau March 10; See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, A skunk in the Corner Road.

 Misty and mizzling

weather almost April-like –

expect to hear geese.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Umbrella weather, expecting geese.

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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