I would make a chart of our life,
know why just this circle of creatures
completes the world.
Henry Thoreau, April 18, 1852
[Hawkweeds] suggest a history to nature,
a natural history in a new sense.
June 11. The veiny-leaved hieracium with one leaf on its stem, not long open. June 11, 1856
June 15. The Hieracium venosum, veiny-leaved hawkweed, with its yellow blossoms in the woodland path. June 15, 1851
June 23. Veiny-leaved hawkweed, how long? June 23, 1858
June 23. Veiny-leaved hawkweed freshly out. June 23, 1859
July 17. I think we have no Hieracium Gronovii, though one not veined always and sometimes with two or more leaves on stem. July 17, 1853
July 21. The rough hawkweed, too, resembling in its flower the autumnal dandelion. July 21, 1851
July 25. The Hieracium Canadense grows by the road fence in Potter's hydrocotyle field, some seven or eight inches high, in dense tufts! July 25, 1856
July 28. What is that slender hieracium or aster-like plant in woods on Corner road with lanceolate, coarsely feather-veined leaves, sessile and remotely toothed; minute, clustered, imbricate buds (?) or flowers and buds? Panicled hieracium? July 28, 1852
July 28. That low hieracium, hairy, especially the lower part, with several hairy, obovate or oblanceolate leaves, remotely, very slightly, toothed, and glandular hairs on peduncles and calyx, a few heads, some days at least. July 28, 1853
July 29. What I have called Hieracium Gronovii. . . has achenia like H. venosum; so I will give it up. July 29, 1856 [“Hieracium gronovii has not been recorded from Middlesex County, Massachusetts" ~ Vascular Flora of Concord, Massachusetts]
July 31. Hieracium paniculatum by Gerardia quercifolia path in woods under Cliffs, two or three days. July 31, 1856
August 1. Hieracium Canadense, apparently a day or two. August 1, 1854
August 5. The Hieracium scabrum is just opening. August 5, 1852
August 6. Hieracium paniculatum. August 6, 1852
August 6. Hieracium scabrous. August 6, 1856
August 8. Also rough hawkweed. August 8, 1853
August 9. The Hieracium Canadense is out and is abundant at Peter's well. August 9, 1853
August 17. Hieracium Canadense. August 17, 1856
August 21. Hieracium paniculatum, a very delicate and slender hawkweed August 21, 1851
August 21. I have now found all the hawkweeds. Singular these genera of plants, plants manifestly related yet distinct. They suggest a history to nature, a natural history in a new sense. August 21, 1851
September 1. The Hieracium Canadense is, methinks, the largest and handsomest flower of its genus, large as the fall dandelion; the paniculatum the most delicate. September 1, 1853
September 20. Hieracium down is in the air. September 20, 1852
October 2. The veiny-leaved hawkweed in blossom (again?). October 2, 1852
October 2. Hieracium Canadense still quite fresh, with its very pretty broad strap-shaped rays, broadest at the end, alternately long and short, with five very regular sharp teeth in the end of each. October 2, 1856
October 6. I notice Hieracium paniculatum and scabrum in dark, low wood-paths, turned a hoary white. October 6, 1858
October 11. Hieracium venosum still. October 11, 1856
October 23. Also a hieracium quite freshly bloomed, but with white, bristly leaves and smooth stem, about twenty-flowered; peduncles and involucres glandular-hairy. Is it Gronovii or veiny-leaved? Almost as slender as the panicled. October 23, 1853
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Hawkweeds (hieracium)
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 © 2009-2026
