My ruby-crowned or crested wren

April 20. 

Hear and see my ruby-crowned or crested wren singing at 6 a. m. on Wheildon's pines. 

Ruby-Crowned Wren on Kalmia Angustifollia

Setting pines all day.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 20, 1859

Hear and see my ruby-crowned or crested wren singing. See April 25, 1854 (“A very interesting and active little fellow, darting about amid the tree-tops, and his song quite remarkable and rich and loud for his size. Begins with a very fine note, before its pipes are filled, not audible at a little distance, then woriter weter, etc., etc., winding up with teter teter, all clear and round. This was at 4 p. m., when most birds do not sing. I saw it yesterday, pluming itself and stretching its little wings. Our smallest bird, methinks, except the hummingbird.”); May 6, 1855 ("Hear at a distance a ruby(?)-crowned wren, so robin-like and spirited. After see one within ten or fifteen feet. Dark bill and legs, apparently dark olivaceous ashy head, a little whitish before and behind the full black eyes, ash breast, olive-yellow on primaries, with a white bar, dark tail and ends of wings, white belly and vent. Did not notice vermilion spot on hindhead. It darts off from apple tree for insects like a pewee, and returns to within ten feet of me as if curious. I think this the only Regulus I have ever seen.”);  May 7, 1855 (“Climbed to two crows’ nests . . . A ruby-crested wren is apparently attracted and eyes me.”); July 14, 1856 (“Saw apparently my little ruby(?)-crested wren(?) on the weeds there.”); April 30, 1857 (“Hear again the same bird heard at Conantum April 18th, which I think must be the ruby-crowned wren. ”); April 29, 1858  (“I Heard yesterday at Ledum Swamp the lively, sweet, yet somewhat whimsical note of the ruby crowned wren.");  April 26, 1860 ("Hear the ruby-crowned wren in the morning, near George Heywood’s.”). See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau: the ruby-crowned or crested wren and note to December 25, 1859 ("I hear a sharp fine screep from some bird,. . . I can see a brilliant crown. . . . It is evidently the golden-crested wren, which I have not made out before.”)

Wheildon's pines. See December 21, 1855 (“ I hear and see tree sparrows on Wheildon’s pines,”); March 21, 1859 ("I see several white pine cones in the path by Wheildon's . . . Others still hold on.”) 

Setting pines all day. See April 19, 1859 ("Began to set white pines in R.W.E.'s Wyman lot."); April 21, 1859 (" Setting pines all day. This makes two and a half days, with two men and a horse and cart to help me. We have set some four hundred trees at fifteen feet apart diamondwise, covering some two acres. I set every one with my own hand") April 22, 1859 ("When setting the pines at Walden the last three days,I was sung to by the field sparrow. . . .As I planted there, wandering thoughts visited me, which I have now forgotten.")

See also  A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, April 20

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau

 "A book, each page written in its own season,

out-of-doors, in its own locality."

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