A Book of Seasons: the Propogation of the Black Willow.

I would make a chart of our life,

know why just this circle of creatures

completes the world.

Henry Thoreau, April 18, 1852

The more I study willows,

the more I am confused. 

April 9, 1853

February 14. I was struck to-day by the size and continuousness of the natural willow hedge on the east side of the rail road causeway, at the foot of the embankment, next to the fence. Some twelve years ago, when that causeway was built through the meadows, there were no willows there or near there, but now, just at the foot of the sand-bank, where it meets the meadow, and on the line of the fence, quite a dense willow hedge has planted itself.  I used to think that the seeds were brought with the sand from the Deep Cut in the woods, but there is no golden willow there; but now I think that the seeds have been blown hither from a distance, and lodged against the foot of the bank, just as the snow-drift accumulates there, for I see several ash trees among them, which have come from an ash ten rods east in the meadow, though none has sprung up elsewhere. February 14 , 1856

March 2. Go and measure to what length the silvery willow catkins have crept out beyond their scales, if you would know what time o' the year it is by Nature's clock. March 2, 1859

May 10. I perceive the sweetness of the willows on the causeway. May 10, 1854

May 11. The early willows, which bloom before leafing, are going to seed.  May 11, 1856

May 12.  When I consider how many species of willow have been planted along the railroad causeway within ten years, of which no one knows the history, and not one in Concord beside myself can tell the name of one, so that it is quite a discovery to identify a single one in a year, and yet within this period the seeds of all these kinds have been conveyed from some other locality to this, I am reminded how much is going on that man wots not of.  May 12, 1857 

May 14.  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. May 14, 1852 

May 15. Salix discolor seed, or down, begins to blow.  May 15, 1859

May 17. Near Baeomyces Bank, I see the Salix humilis showing its down or cotton, and also the S. tristis. Probably the last is wholly out of bloom some time. May 17, 1858

May 20. No wonder that these small trees are so widely dispersed; their abundant fine and light seed, being buoyed up and wafted far through the atmosphere, speedily clothe the burnt tracts of British America. Heavy-seeded trees are slow to spread themselves, but both air and water combine to transport the seeds of these trees. May 20, 1860

May 23.  Noticed the earliest willow catkins turned to masses of cotton yesterday.  May 23, 1856

May 26. Some of the earliest willows about warm edges of woods are gone to seed and downy.  May 26, 1857 

May 28.  Some Salix rostrata seed begins to fly. . . . Also S. Torreyana seed, just begun to fly. S. pedicellaris long out of bloom there.   May 28, 1859

May 30. The Salix tristis generally shows its down now along dry wood-paths. May 30, 1860

June 4. Salix tristis is going to seed, showing some cotton; also some S. rostrate.  June 4, 1857

June 7. The Salix tristis is now generally going or gone to seed. June 7, 1858

June 8. I observe in a mass of damp shavings and leaves and sand there, in the shade, a little prostrate willow just coming into flower, perhaps a black willow. Pulling it up, I find it to be a twig about sixteen inches long, two thirds buried in the damp mass. This was probably broken off by the ice, brought down, washed up, and buried like a layer there; and now, for two thirds its length, it has put out rootlets an inch or two long abundantly, and leaves and catkins from the part above ground.  So vivacious is the willow, availing itself of every accident to spread along the river’s bank. The ice that strips it only disperses it the more widely. It never says die. May I be as vivacious as a willow. . . .Some species are so brittle at the base of the twigs that they break on the least touch, but they are as tough above as tender at base, and these twigs are only thus shed like seeds which float away and plant themselves in the first bank on which they lodge. I commonly litter my boat with a shower of these black willow twigs whenever I run into them.  June 8, 1856

June 9. The willow down and seeds are blowing over the causeway. June 9, 1854

June 9. Standing on the Mill - Dam this afternoon, after one of these showers, I noticed the air full of some kind of down, which at first I mistook for feathers or lint from some chamber, then for light-winged insects, for it rose and fell just like the flights of may-flies. At length I traced it to the white willow behind the blacksmith's shop, which apparently the rain has released. The wind was driving it up between and over the buildings, and it was flying all along the Mill-Dam in a stream, filling the air like a flight of bright-colored gauze-winged insects, as high as the roofs. It was the willow down with a minute blackish seed in the midst or beneath. In the moist air, seen against the still dark clouds, like large white dancing motes, from time to time falling to earth. The rain had apparently loosened them, and the slight breeze succeeding set them a-going.  June 9 , 1860

June 15.  Black willow is now gone to seed, and its down covers the water, white amid the weeds. June 15, 1854 

June 15.  Notice the down of the white willow near the bridge , twenty rods off, whitening Sassafras Shore for two or three rods like a dense white foam. It is all full of lit tle seeds not sprouted , is as dense as fur, and has first blown fifteen rods overland.  This is a late willow to ripen, but the black willow shows no down yet, as I notice. It is very conspicuously white along the shore a foot or two wide, – a dense downy coat or fleece on the water. Has blown northeast.  June 15, 1860

June 16. The Salix nigra appears to be quite done. June 16, 1858

June 26.  The black willow down is now quite conspicuous on the trees, giving them a parti-colored or spotted white and green look, quite interesting, like a fruit. It also rests on the water by the sides of the stream, where caught by alders, etc., in narrow crescents ten and five feet long, at right angles with the bank, so thick and white as to remind me of a dense mass of hoar-frost crystals. June 26, 1859 

June 26.  Young black willows have sprouted and put forth their two minute round leafets where the cottony seeds have lodged in a scum against the alders, etc. Leafets from one fortieth to one twenty-fifth of an inch in diameter. When separated from the continuous film of down they have a tendency to sink. June 26, 1860

  

June 27. To-day it is cool and clear and quite windy, and the black willow down is now washed up and collected against the alders and weeds, and the river looking more sparkling June 27, 1860 

June 29.  The river is now whitened with the down of the black willow, and I am surprised to see a minute plant abundantly springing from its midst and greening it,. . ., — like grass growing in cotton in a tumbler June 29, 1857 

July 8. About the same time and locality [two miles below the summit of Mt. Washington], Salix Uva-ursi, the prevailing willow of the alpine region, completely out of bloom and going or gone to seed, a flat, trailing, glossy-leaved willow with the habit of the bearberry, spreading in a close mat over the rocks or rocky surface. July 8  1858

July 9. I see that the seeds of the Salix nigra gathered on the catkins on the 7th , or two days since , put in tumblers of water . in my window, have already germinated ! and show those two little roundish green leaves. July 9, 1857

July 9. There is now but little black willow down left on the trees. . . . I think I see how this tree is propagated by its seeds. Its countless minute brown seeds, just perceptible to the naked eye in the midst of their cotton, are wafted with the cotton to the water, — most abundantly about a fortnight ago, – and there they drift and form a thick white scum together with other matter, especially against some alder or other fallen or drooping shrub where there is less current than usual . There, within two or three days, a great many germinate and show their two little roundish leaves, more or less tingeing with green the surface of the scum, — somewhat like grass seed in a tumbler of cotton. Many of these are drifted in amid the button - bushes, willows , and other shrubs , and the sedge, along the riverside, and the water falling just at this time, when they have put forth little fibres, they are deposited on the mud just left bare in the shade, and thus probably a great many of them have a chance to become perfect plants. But if they do not drift into sufficiently shallow water and are not left on the mud just at the right time, probably they perish. The mud in many such places is now green with them, though perhaps the seed has often blown directly through the air to such places. July 9, 1857

 July 9. The button-bush and black willow generally grow together, especially on the brink of the stagnant parts of the river. July 9, 1859   

July 10. Put some more black willow seed in a tumbler of water at 9.30 a. m.  July 10, 1857

July 10. Salix herbacea, a pretty, trailing, roundish-leaved willow going to seed, but apparently not so early as the S. Uva-ursi. July 10, 1858

July 28. The black willows are the children of the river. They do not grow far from the water, not on the steep banks which the river is wearing into, not on the unconverted shore, but on the bars and banks which the river has made. A bank may soon get to be too high for it. It grows and thrives on the river-made shores and banks, and is a servant which the river uses to build up and defend its banks and isles. It is married to the river. Where an eddy is depositing a sand-bar, anon to be elevated into an island or bank, there especially the black willow flourishes. July 28, 1859

August 2. The black willow down is even yet still seen here and there on the water. August 2, 1860

August 5. These willows appear to grow best on elevated sand-bars or deep sandy banks, which the stream has brought down, leaving a little meadow behind them, at some bend, often mixed with sawdust from a mill. They root themselves firmly here, and spread entirely over the sand. August 5, 1858

August 7.  The most luxuriant groves of black willow, as I recall them, are on the inside curves, or on sandy capes between the river and a bay, or sandy banks parallel with the firmer shore. . .They also grow on both sides sometimes, where the river runs straight through stagnant meadows or swamps . . . —or on one side, though straight, along the edge of a swamp,—. . .but rarely ever against a firm bank or hillside, the positive male shore. August 7, 1858

August 12. The black willow hardly ceases to shed its down when it looks yellowish.  August 12, 1860

August 15. I notice the black willows . . . to see where they grow, distinguishing ten places. In seven instances they are on the concave or female side distinctly. . . . Almost the only exceptions to their growing on the concave side exclusively are a few mouths of brooks and edges of swamps, where, apparently, there is an eddy or slow current. Similar was my observation on the Assabet. August 15, 1858 

August 19. I noticed the localities of black willows as far up as the mouth of the river in Fair Haven Pond, but not so carefully as elsewhere, and from the last observations I infer that the willow grows especially and almost exclusively in places where the drift is most likely to lodge, as on capes and points and concave sides of the river, though I noticed a few exceptions to my rule. August 19, 1858

  

August 25. Why is the black willow so strictly confined to the bank of the river? August 25, 1856 

August 31. I observe, on the willows on the east shore, the shadow of my boat and self and oars, upside down.  August 31, 1852

A Book of Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau,
  the Propogation of the Black Willow.

 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 ©  2009-2020

See also A Book of Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau.
 Willows on the Causeway.