Monday, October 11, 2021

A Book of the Seasons: October 11 (the note of the chickadee has a new significance, flocking sparrows, acorns, fall flowers and bees, harvest days).

 

The year is but a succession of days,
and I see that I could assign some office to each day
which, summed up, would be the history of the year.
Henry Thoreau, August 24, 1852 



The chickadee's note
 has a new significance 
in cooler weather.

In the woods I hear
a metallic clanging sound –
the note of the jay.
October 11, 1856

The red squirrels scold
and the jays scream while you are
clubbing and shaking trees.

Now when a strong wind
precedes you is the best time
to gather these nuts.



October 11, ,2019
There was a very severe frost this morning (ground stiffened) October 11, 1859

Another frost last night, although with fog, and this afternoon the maple and other leaves strew the water, and it is almost a leaf harvest. October 11, 1857

The note of the chickadee, heard now in cooler weather and above many fallen leaves, has a new significance. October 11, 1859

In the woods I hear the note of the jay, a metallic, clanging sound, some times a mew. Refer any strange note to him. October 11, 1856

The sprout-land and stubble behind the Cliffs are all alive with restless flocks of sparrows of various species. I distinguish F. hyemalis, song sparrow, apparently F. juncorum . . . and chip-birds (?). They are continually flitting past and surging upward, two or more in pursuit of each other, in the air, where they break like waves, and pass along with a faint cheep. October 11, 1856

Bay-wing sparrows numerous. October 11, 1856

See a white-throat sparrow. October 11, 1858

There is a remarkably abundant crop of white oak acorns this fall, also a fair crop of red oak acorns; but not of scarlet and black, very few of them. The acorns are now in the very midst of their fall. October 11, 1860

Looking under large oaks, black and white, the acorns appear to have fallen or been gathered by squirrels. October 11, 1859

The best time to gather these nuts is now --, when a strong wind has arisen suddenly in the day, before the squirrels precede you October 11, 1860

The Viburnum Lentago is generally a dull red on a green ground, but its leaves are yet quite fresh.
October 11, 1858

The shrub oak plain is now in the perfection of its coloring, the red of young oaks with the green of spiring birches intermixed. A rich rug. October 11, 1856

The patches of huckleberries on Conantum are now red. October 11, 1856

White pines are apparently ready to fall. Some are much paler brown than others. October 11, 1858

The white goldenrod is still common here, and covered with bees. October 11, 1856

A pasture thistle with many fresh flowers and bees on it. October 11, 1856

Here on the Cliffs are fresh poke flowers and small snapdragon and corydalis. October 11, 1856

Hieracium venosum still. October 11, 1856

It is a cool seat under the witch-hazel in full bloom, which has lost its leaves! The leaves are greenish and brownish yellow. October 11, 1858

The osmunda ferns are generally withered and brown except where very much protected from frost. The O. regalis is the least generally withered of them. October 11, 1857

I could detect the progress of a water-bug over the smooth surface in almost any part of the pond.  October 11, 1852

Looking at the reflection of the bank by the Hemlocks, the reflected sun dazzles me, and I approach nearer to the bank in order to shut it out, and I see in the reflection the fine, slender grasses on the sharp or well-defined edge of the bank all glowing with silvery light. October 11, 1857

It is perfect Indian summer, a thick haze forming wreaths in the near horizon. The sun is almost shorn of its rays now at mid-afternoon, and there is only a sheeny reflection from the river.  October 11, 1856

This is the seventh day of glorious weather. Perhaps, these might be called Harvest Days.  October 11, 1857

October 11, 2022


*****

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Witch-Hazel

*****

August 6, 1852 ("I find a bumblebee asleep in a thistle blossom, having crowded himself in deep amid the dense florets, out of the reach of birds, while the sky was overcast")
August 15, 1851 ("Cnicus pumilus, pasture thistle. How many insects a single one attracts ! While you sit by it, bee after bee will visit it, and busy himself probing for honey and loading himself with pollen, regardless of your over shadowing presence. He sees its purple flower from afar, and that use there is in its color.")
August 19, 1853 ("It is a glorious and ever-memorable day. . . . The first bright day of the fall" )
August 21, 1852 ("The bees, wasps, etc. are on the goldenrods, improving their time before the sun of the year sets.")
August 30, 1859 ("Now that flowers are rarer, almost every one of whatever species has bees or butterflies upon it.")
September 3, 1860 ("Here is a beautiful, and perhaps first decidedly autumnal, day, -- a, cloudless sky, a clear air, with, maybe, veins of coolness”)
September 9, 1852 ("The goldenrods resound with the hum of bees and other insects")
September 12, 1854 ("White oak acorns have many of them fallen. . . .. Some black scrub oak acorns have fallen, and a few black oak acorns also have fallen. The red oak began to fall first.")
September 18, 1860 ("This is a beautiful day, warm but not too warm, a harvest day . . . the first unquestionable and conspicuous autumnal day,")
September 18, 1858 ("I think that I see a white-throated sparrow this afternoon.")
September 20, 1851 ("This week we have had most glorious autumnal weather, - cool and cloudless, bright days, filled with the fragrance of ripe grapes, preceded by frosty mornings")
September 21, 1854 ("I hear many jays since the frosts began.”)
September 21, 1859 ("Jays are more frequently heard of late, maybe because other birds are more silent")
September 21, 1856 ("[On top of Cliff, behind the big stump] is a great place for white goldenrod, now in its prime and swarming with honey-bees.")
September 22, 1851 ("It is a beautifully clear and bracing air, with just enough coolness, full of the memory of frosty mornings")

The summer concludes
with the crisis of first frosts.
The end of berries.

September 26, 1858 ("Another smart frost, making dry walking amid the stiffened grass in the morning.")
September 28, 1851 ("I hear the barking of a red squirrel, who is alarmed at something, and a great scolding or ado among the jays. ")
September 28, 1860 ("This morning we had a very severe frost, the first to kill our vines, etc., in garden; what you may call a black frost, - making things look black. Also ice under pump.")
September 29, 1860 ("Another hard frost and a very cold day.")
September 30, 1860 ("Frost and ice.")
September 30, 1854 ("Acorns are generally now turned brown and fallen or falling; the ground is strewn with them and in paths they are crushed by feet and wheels.")
September 30, 1852 ("If there are any sweet flowers still lingering on the hillside, it is known to the bees both of the forest and the village.")
October 1, 1859 ("The shrub oaks on this hill are now at their height, both with respect to their tints and their fruit. . . .Now is the time for shrub oak acorns if not for others.")
October 1, 1852 ("A severer frost last night")
October 1, 1858 ("The cinnamon ferns are crisp and sour in open grounds");
October 1, 1860 (“Remarkable frost and ice this morning; quite a wintry prospect. The leaves of trees stiff and white.”)
October 2, 1857 ("The chickadees of late have winter ways, flocking after you.")
October 2, 1853 ("The gentian in Hubbard's Close is frost-bitten extensively")
October 2, 1852 ("The veiny-leaved hawkweed in blossom (again?) ")
October 4, 1858 ("Osmunda regalis is yellowed and partly crisp and withered, but a little later than the cinnamon.")
October 5, 1857 ("A warm and bright October afternoon.[Begins now ten days of perfect Indian summer without rain; and the eleventh and twelfth days equally warm, though rainy.]")
October 5, 1857 ("The jay seems to scream more fitly and with more freedom now that some fallen maple leaves have made way for his voice")
October 6, 1856 ("The jay's shrill note is more distinct of late about the edges of the woods, when so many birds have left us.”)
October 6, 1856 ("The common notes of the chickadee, so rarely heard for a long time, and also one phebe strain from it, amid the Leaning Hemlocks, remind me of pleasant winter days, when they are more commonly seen").
October 6, 1857 ("A beautiful bright afternoon, still warmer than yesterday.") 
October 6, 1858 ("Most S. nemoralis, and most other goldenrods, now look hoary, killed by frost. The corn stands bleached and faded — quite white in the twilight")
October 8, 1855 ("See apparently white-throated sparrows hopping under covert of the button-bushes.”)
October 8, 1856 (“The trees and weeds by the Turnpike are all alive this pleasant afternoon with twittering sparrows . . .They are all together and keep up a faint warbling, apparently the white-throats and tree sparrows, — if the last are there”)
October 8, 1857 ("I see and hear white-throated sparrows on the swamp white oaks by the river's edge, uttering a faint sharp cheep.")
October 9, 1858 (“Bay-wings flit along road.”)
October 10, 1859 ("White-throated sparrows in yard and close up to house.")
October 11, 1851 ("The chickadee, sounding all alone, now that birds are getting scarce, reminds me of the winter, in which it almost alone is heard")
October 10, 1851 ("flitting ever nearer and nearer and nearer, inquisitively, till the boldest was within five feet of me")
October 10, 1856 ("The phebe note of the chickadee is now often heard in the yards")
October 10, 1856 (“These are the finest days in the year, Indian summer.")
October 10, 1857 ("The sixth day of glorious weather, which I am tempted to call the finest in the year , so bright and serene the air and such a sheen from the earth, so brilliant the foliage, so pleasantly warm.")
October 10, 1857 ("Certainly these are .the most brilliant days in the year, ushered in, perhaps, by a frosty morning, as this.")





October 12, 1857 ("The eighth fine day, warmer than the last two.")
October 12, 1856 ("It is interesting to see how some of the few flowers which still linger are frequented by bees and other insects.")
October 12, 1859 ("There are now apparently very few ferns left . . . This morning's frost will nearly finish them. . . .We have now fairly begun to be surrounded with the brown of withered foliage. . .  gradually the plants, or their leaves, are killed and withered that we scarcely notice it till we are surrounded with the scenery of November.")
October 12, 1859 (“I see scattered flocks of bay-wings amid the weeds and on the fences.”)
October 12, 1852 ("A new carpet of pine leaves is forming in the woods. The forest is laying down her carpet for the winter.")
October 12, 1855 ("The leaves fallen last night now lie thick on the water next the shore, concealing it, —fleets of dry boats ")
October 12, 1858 ("There are many maple, birch, etc., leaves on the Assabet, in stiller places along the shore, but not yet a leaf harvest")
October 12, 1858 ("Acorns, red and white (especially the first), appear to be fallen or falling. They are so fair and plump and glossy that I love to handle them, and am loath to throw away what I have in my hand.")
October 13, 1852 ("It is a clear, warm, rather Indian-summer day. . . we welcome and appreciate it all. The chickadees take heart, too, and sing above these warm rocks.")
October 13, 1859 ("I see no acorns on the trees. They appear to have all fallen before this.")
October 13, 1860 ("This is a white oak year, . . . I should think that there might be a bushel or two of acorns on and under some single trees.")
October 13, 1857 ("This has been the ninth of those wonderful days, and one of the warmest").
October 13, 1859 ("The chickadee seems to lisp a sweeter note")
October 13, 1860 ("Now, as soon as the frost strips the maples, and their leaves strew the swamp floor and conceal the pools, the note of the chickadee sounds cheerfully winteryish.")
October 13, 1854 ("A thick carpet of white pine needles lies now lightly, half an inch or more in thickness, above the dark-reddish ones of last year.")
October 14, 1852 ("The pines are now two-colored, green and yellow, - the latter just below the ends of the boughs.")
October 14, 1859 ("The ground is strewn also with red oak acorns now, and, as far as I can discover, acorns of all kinds have fallen.")
October 14, 1856 ("Pine-needles, just fallen, now make a thick carpet.")
October 14, 1852 ("Jays and chickadees are oftener heard in the fall than in summer.")
October 15. The chickadees are hopping near on the hemlock a
October 15, 1856 ("Large fleets of maple and other leaves are floating on its surface as I go up the Assabet.")
October 15, 1853 ("Last night the first smart frost that I have witnessed. Ice formed under the pump, and the ground was white long after sunrise.") 
October 15, 1856 (“A smart frost . . . . Ground stiffened in morning; ice seen.”)
October 15, 1856 (" The chickadees are hopping near on the hemlock above. They resume their winter ways before the winter comes.")
October 15, 1859 ("The chickadees sing as if at home. They are not travelling singers hired by any Barnum. Theirs is an honest, homely, heartfelt melody.")
October 16, 1856 (“Ground all white with frost. ”)
October 16, 1854 ("The pines, too, have fallen")
October 16, 1855 ("How evenly the freshly fallen pine-needles are spread on the ground! quite like a carpet. Throughout this grove no square foot is left bare")
October 17, 1856 (" I heard a smart tche-day-day-day close to my ear, and, looking up, see four of these birds, which had come to scrape acquaintance with me, hopping amid the alders within three and four feet of me. I had heard them further off at first, and they had followed me along the hedge. They day-day 'd and lisp their faint notes alternately, and then, as if to make me think they had some other errand than to peer at me, they peck the dead twigs with their bills — the little top-heavy, black-crowned, volatile fellows.")
October 17, 1856 ("Frost has now within three or four days turned almost all flowers to woolly heads, — their November aspect") 
October 17, 1857 ("The swamp floor is covered with red maple leaves, many yellow with bright-scarlet spots or streaks. Small brooks are almost concealed by them. ")
October 17, 1858 ("They remind me of ditches in swamps, whose surfaces are often quite concealed by leaves now. The waves made by my boat cause them to rustle, ")
October 17, 1856 ("Countless leafy skiffs . . . concealing the water quite from foot and eye")
October 18, 1852 ("Chickadees and jays are heard from the shore as in winter")
October 19, 1853 ("The leaves have fallen so plentifully that they quite conceal the water along the shore, and rustle pleasantly when the wave which the boat creates strikes them.")
October 19, 1856 ("The hypericums — the whole plant — have now generally been killed by the frost")
October 20, 1858 (" A white-throated sparrow.")
October 20, 1856 ("Thus, of late, when the season is declining, many birds have departed, and our thoughts are turned towards winter . . . we hear the jay again more frequently, and the chickadees are more numerous and lively and familiar and utter their phebe note,")
October 21, 1857 (“First ice that I’ve seen or heard of, a tenth of an inch thick in yard, and the ground is slightly frozen.”); 
October 21, 1852 ("Apparently some flowers yield to the frosts, others linger here and there till the snow buries them.")
October 22, 1853 ("This great fleet of scattered leaf boats, still tight and dry, each one curled up on every side by the sun's skill,")
October 22, 1858 ("On the top of the Cliff I see a mullein freshly out, very handsome Aster undulatus, and an abundance of the little blue snapdragon.")
October 22, 1851 ("The Canada snapdragon still blooms bluely by the roadside.")
October 22, 1857 ("Now is just the time for chestnuts.”)
October 22, 1851 ("The pines, both white and pitch, have now shed their leaves, and the ground in the pine woods is strewn with the newly fallen needles")
October 23, 1852 (" The chickadees flit along, following me inquisitively a few rods with lisping, tinkling note, — flit within a few feet of me from curiosity, head downward on the pines.")
October 23, 1853 ("Viburnum Lentago, with ripe berries and dull-glossy red leaves.")
October 25, 1853 ("The ground is strewn with pine-needles as sunlight.")

As woods grow silent
we attend to the cheerful
notes of chickadees.

October 27, 1853 ("Now it is time to look out for walnuts, last and hardest crop of the year? ")
October 27, 1855 ("It is high time we came a-nutting,")
October 30, 1853 (" A white frost this morning, lasting late into the day. This has settled the accounts of many plants which lingered still. . . .What with the rains and frosts and winds, the leaves have fairly fallen now. You may say the fall has ended.")
November 1, 1852 ("On the river this afternoon, the leaves, now crisp and curled, when the wind blows them on to the water become rude boats which float and sail about awhile conspicuously before they go to the bottom.")
November 3, 1858 ("The jay is the bird of October. I have seen it repeatedly flitting amid the bright leaves,. . .It, too, with its bright color, stands for some ripeness in the bird harvest. And its scream! it is as if it blowed on the edge of an October leaf. It is never more in its element and at home than when flitting amid these brilliant colors.")
November 4, 1855 (“The winter is approaching. The birds are almost all gone. The note of the dee de de sounds now more distinct, prophetic of winter, as I go amid the wild apples on Nawshawtuct.”)
November 9, 1850 (" The chickadees, if I stand long enough, hop nearer and nearer inquisitively, from pine bough to pine bough, till within four or five feet, occasionally lisping a note"
November 11, 1850 ("Now is the time for wild apples.")
November 18, 1858 (" Now is the time to gather the mocker-nuts.”)
December 1, 1853 (“[T]he little chickadees . . . inquisitively hop nearer and nearer to me. They are our most honest and innocent little bird, drawing yet nearer to us as the winter advances, and deserve best of any of the walker.”)
December 9, 1853 ("The third (at least) glorious day, clear and not too cold . . .with peculiarly long and clear cloudless silvery twilights morn and eve")

October 11, 2019

If you make the least correct 
observation of nature this year,
 you will have occasion to repeat it
 with illustrations the next, 
and the season and life itself is prolonged.

October 10 <<<<<<<<<  October 11 >>>>>>>>  October 12

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau,  October 11
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 © 2009-2022

https://tinyurl.com/HDT-11Oct

 
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