By the black oaks at the sand hole east of Clamshell.

September 11. 

Friday. Up railroad and to Clamshell. 

Solidago puberula apparently in prime, with the S. stricta, near gerardia oaks. 

Red choke-berry ripe; how long? On the east edge of Dennis Swamp, where I saw the strange warbler once. 

To my surprise I find, by the black oaks at the sand hole east of Clamshell, the Solidago rigida, apparently in prime or a little past. The heads and rays were so large I thought at first it must be a hieracium. The rays are from ten to fourteen, and three to three and a half fortieths of an inch wide. The middle leaves are clasping by a heart-shaped base. The heads are seven fortieths of an inch wide and seventeen fortieths long, in recurved panicles, – these. Eaton says truly, “Scales of the calyx round-obtuse, nerved, membranous at the edges.” 

My old S. stricta (early form) must be S. arguta var. juncea. It is now done.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 11, 1857

Red choke-berry ripe; how long? See September 1, 1856 ("red choke-berries, which last further up in this swamp, with their peculiar glossy red and squarish form, are really very handsome.")

Dennis Swamp... See May 30, 1855 ("Hear a familiar warbler not recognized for some years, in the thick copse in Dennis’s Swamp,")

by the black oaks at the sand hole east of Clamshell, the Solidago rigida, apparently in prime. See September 26, 1857 ("Solidago rigida, just done, within a rod southwest of the oak"). See also September 15, 1854 (“Solidago speciosa at Clamshell out several days”); . September 27, 1856 (“To Clamshell by boat. Solidago speciosa not quite out!!”)

Solidago puberula apparently in prime, with the S. stricta . . .My old S. stricta (early form) must be S. Arguta var. juncea. See  August 21, 1856 ("the prevailing solidagos now are, lst, stricta (the upland and also meadow one which I seem to have called puberula), 2d, the three-ribbed, of apparently several varieties, which I have called arguta or gigantea (apparently truly the last)");  September 6, 1856 ("Solidago arguta very common, apparently in prime, with sharp-toothed, more or less elliptic leaves and slender terminal drooping racemes; size of S. stricta."): September 15, 1856 ("Early Solidago stricta (that is, arguta) done . . .").