What is that small conyza-like aster,?

July 19. 

Clematis has been open a day or two. 

The alisma will open to-morrow or next day. 

This morning a fog and cool.

What is that small conyza-like aster, with flaccid linear leaves, in woods near Boiling Spring? 

Some woodbine, cultivated, apparently long since flowered. The same of some on Lee's Cliff, where it is early.


H. D. Thoreau, Journal, July 19, 1853

Clematis has been open a day or two. See July 14, 1853 ('The Clematis  [by the Heywood Brook](near the water-plantain) will open in a day or two.")

This morning a fog and cool. See July 22, 1851 ("The season of morning fogs has arrived. . . .These are our fairest days, which are born in a fog."); July 22, 1854 ("Fogs almost every morning now."); July 25, 1852 ("the sun having risen, I see great wreaths of fog far northeast, revealing the course of the river.")

What is that small conyza-like aster, with flaccid linear leaves?. See July 18, 1854 ("Methinks the asters and goldenrods begin, like the early ripening leaves, with midsummer heats."); July 26, 1853 ("I mark again, about this time when the first asters open. . . This the afternoon of the year."); July 28, 1852 ("Goldenrod and asters have fairly begun; i. e. there are several kinds of each out. ") [Note; Conyza (horseweed, butterweed or fleabane) is a genus of flowering plants in the sunflower family.

Woodbine, long since flowered. See September 12, 1851 ("What we call woodbine is the Vitis hederacea, or common creeper, or American ivy.")

Behind a picture in R. W. E.'s dining-room.

August 10. 

2 p.m. — Air, 84°; Boiling Spring this after noon., 46°; Brister's, 49°; or where there is little or no surface water the same as in spring. Walden is at surface 80° (air over it 76). 

Aster dumosus and pennyroyal out; how long? 

Sand cherry is well ripe — some of it — and tolerable, better than the red cherry or choke-cherry. 

Juncus acuminatus aka paradoxus

Juncus paradoxus, that large and late juncus (tailed), as in Hubbard's Close and on island above monument and in Great Meadows, say ten days. 

Saw yesterday in Fitzwilliam from the railroad a pond covered with white lilies uniformly about half the size of ours! 

Saw this evening, behind a picture in R. W. E.'s dining-room, the hoary bat. First heard it fluttering at dusk, it having hung there all day. Its rear parts covered with a fine hoary down.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, August 10, 1860

Aster dumosus and pennyroyal out; how long? See August 5, 1856 ("Aster dumosus, apparently a day or two, with its large conspicuous flower-buds at the end of the branchlets and linear-spatulate involucral scales."); August 11, 1853 ("Evening draws on while I am gathering bundles of pennyroyal on the further Conantum height. I find it amid the stubble mixed with blue-curls and, as fast as I get my hand full, tie it into a fragrant bundle.”)

Sand cherry is well ripe. July 28, 1856 ("Sand cherry ripe. The fruit droops in umble-like clusters, two to four peduncles together, on each side the axil of a branchlet or a leaf. . . . It is black when ripe.")

Juncus paradoxus, that large and late juncus (tailed), as in Hubbard's Close and on island. See August 30, 1858 ("Juncus paradoxus, with seeds tailed at both ends, (it is fresher than what I have seen before, and smaller), not done. Some of it with few flowers! A terete leaf rises above the flower. It looks like a small bayonet rush.")

August 10. See A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau , August 10

 

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 © 2009-2021

A bay-wing on the railroad fence sings.

April 13

Sunday. 8 A.M. — Up railroad. 

Cold, and froze in the night. 

The sallow will not open till some time to-day. 

I hear a bay-wing on the railroad fence sing, the rhythm somewhat like, char char (or here here), che che, chip chip chip (fast), chitter chitter chitter chit (very fast and jingling), tchea tchea (jinglingly). It has another strain, considerably different, but a second also sings the above. Two on different posts are steadily singing the same, as if contending with each other, notwithstanding the cold wind. 

P. M. — To Walden and Fair Haven Ponds. 

Still cold and windy. 

The early gooseberry leaf-buds in garden have burst, -- now like small green frilled horns. 

Also the amelanchier flower-buds are bursting. 

As I go down the railroad causeway, I see a flock of eight or ten bay-wing sparrows flitting along the fence and alighting on an apple tree. There are many robins about also. Do they not incline more to fly in flocks a cold and windy day like this? 

The snow ice is now all washed and melted off of Walden, down to the dark-green clear ice, which appears to be seven or eight inches thick and is quite hard still. At a little distance you would mistake it for water; further off still, as from Fair Haven Hill, it is blue as in summer. You can still get on to it from the southerly side, but elsewhere there is a narrow canal, two or three to twelve feet wide, next the shore. It may last four or five days longer, even if the weather is warm. 

As I go by the Andromeda Ponds, I hear the tut tut of a few croaking frogs, and at Well Meadow I hear once or twice a prolonged stertorous sound, as from river meadows a little later usually, which is undoubtedly made by a different frog from the first. 

Fair Haven Pond, to my surprise, is completely open. It was so entirely frozen over on the 8th that I think the finishing stroke must have been given to it but by last night’s rain. Say then apparently April 13th (?).

Return over the Shrub Oak Plain and the Cliff. 

Still no cowslips nor saxifrage. 

There were alders out at Well Meadow Head, as large bushes as any. Can they be A. serrulata? Vide leaves by and by. 

Standing on the Cliffs, I see most snow when I look southwest; indeed scarcely a particle in any other direction, far or near, from which and from other observations, I infer that there is most snow now under the northeast sides of the hills, especially in ravines there. 

At the entrance to the Boiling Spring wood, just beyond the orchard (of Hayden), the northeast angle of the wood, there is still a snow-drift as high as the wall, or three and a half feet deep, stretching quite across the road at that height, and the snow reaches six rods down the road. I doubt if there is as much in the road anywhere else in the town. It is quite impassable there still to a horse, as it has been all winter. 

This is the heel of the winter. 

Scare up two turtle doves in the dry stubble in Wheeler’s hill field by the railroad. I saw two together once before this year; probably they have paired.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 13, 1856

The sallow will not open till some time to-day. See April 13, 1856 ("The sallow up railroad will [shed pollen], if it is pleasant, to-morrow . . .  the reddish anthers are beginning to push from one side near the end, and you know that a little yellow flame will have burst out there by to-morrow.") 

I hear a bay-wing  on the railroad fence sing. . . . Two on different posts are steadily singing the same. See  April 13, 1854 (" Did I see a bay-wing? "); April 13, 1855 (“See a sparrow without marks on throat or breast, running peculiarly in the dry grass in the open field beyond, and hear its song, and then see its white feathers in tail; the bay-wing.” );  See also April 2, 1858 (”On the side of Fair Haven Hill I go looking for bay wings . . . At last I see one, which . . . warbles a peculiar long and pleasant strain, . . .and close by I see another, apparently a bay-wing, though I do not see its white in tail, and it utters while sitting the same subdued, rather peculiar strain.”); A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Bay-Wing Sparrow and A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, As the Bay-Wing Sang

Also the amelanchier flower-buds are bursting. See April 2, 1853 ("The amelanchier buds look more forward than those of any shrub I notice");  April 11, 1856 ("The flower-buds of the amelanchier are somewhat expanded,"); April 17, 1860 ("The amelanchier flower-buds are conspicuously swollen"); April 18, 1855 ("The shad-bush flower-buds, beginning to expand, look like leaf-buds bursting now.") See also  A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Shad-bush, Juneberry, or Service-berry (Amelanchier canadensis)

As I go by the Andromeda Ponds, I hear the tut tut of a few croaking frogs. See April 13, 1855 ("The small croaking frogs are now generally heard in all those stagnant ponds or pools in woods floored with leaves, which are mainly dried up in the summer.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Wood Frog (Rana sylvatica)

At Well Meadow I hear once or twice a prolonged stertorous sound, as from river meadows a little later usually, which is undoubtedly made by a different frog from the first. See April 13, 1859 ("To-day is the awakening of the meadows now partly bare. I hear the stuttering note of probably the Rana halecina (see one by shore) come up from all the Great Meadow,"); see also March 31, 1857 ("To-day both croakers and peepers are pretty numerously heard, and I hear one faint stertorous (bullfrog-like ??) sound on the river meadow.";  April 15, 1855 ("That general tut tut tut tut, or snoring, of frogs on the shallow meadow heard first slightly the 5th. There is a very faint er er er now and then mixed with it"); April 16, 1856 ("I hear that same stertorous note of a frog or two as was heard the 13th, apparently from quite across all this flood, and which I have so often observed before. What kind is it?"); May 23, 1856 ("At the same time I hear a low, stertorous, dry, but hard-cored note from some frog in the meadows and along the riverside; often heard in past years but not accounted for. Is it a Rana palustris?") and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Leopard Frog (Rana Halecina) in Spring

Fair Haven Pond, to my surprise, is completely open. See  March 26, 1860 ("Fair Haven Pond may be open by the 20th of March, as this year [1860], or not till April 13 as in '56,"); ; March 26, 1857 ("  Fair Haven .is open; may have been open several days; there is only a little ice on the southeast shore. "); March 27, 1858 ("Fair Haven Pond four fifths clear."); March 28, 1855 ("The river has not yet quite worn its way through Fair Haven Pond, but probably will to-morrow."March 31, 1855 ("). March 28, 1858 ("Fair Haven Pond is open. This and Flint's and Walden all open together this year"); Looking from the Cliffs I see that  Fair Haven Pond will open by day after to-morrow. "); April 4, 1852 (“This pond is now open; only a little ice against the Pleasant Meadow.”); .  April 7, 1854 ("Fair Haven is completely open")

Still no cowslips nor saxifrage.  See March 27, 1855 ("Am surprised to see the cowslip so forward, showing so much green, in E. Hubbard’s Swamp, in the brook, where it is sheltered from the winds. The already expanded leaves rise above the water. If this is a spring growth, it is the most forward herb I have seen");   April 8, 1856  ("I find two cowslips in full bloom, shedding pollen; and they may have opened two or three days ago; for I saw many conspicuous buds here on the 2d");  April 9, 1853 ("The cowslips are well out, – the first conspicuous herbaceous flower. ."); April 13, 1855 ("Many cowslip buds show a little yellow, but they will not open there [Second Division] for two or three days. The road is paved with solid ice there.  "); April 3, 1853 ("To my great surprise the saxifrage is in bloom. It was, as it were, by mere accident that I found it. I had not observed any particular forwardness in it, when, happening to look under a projecting rock in a little nook on the south side of a stump, I spied one little plant which had opened three or four blossoms high up the Cliff"); s. April 6, 1858 ("On a few small warm shelves under the rocks the saxifrage . . .; has got up three or four inches, and may have been out four or five days"); April 13, 1854 ("The saxifrage is pretty common, ahead of the crowfoot now, and its peduncles have shot up.') See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Earliest Flower  and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Cowslip in Early Spring and A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Saxifrage in Spring

There were alders out at Well Meadow Head . . . Can they be A. serrulata?  See  April 13, 1855 ("The serrulata will undoubtedly blossom to-morrow in some places.");  April 2, 1856 ("The alder scales do not even appear relaxed yet ");   April 4, 1856 ("The alder scales south of the railroad, beyond the bridge, are loosened. This corresponds to the opening (not merely expansion showing the fuzziness) of the white maple buds.");  April 9, 1856 ("The Alnus incana, especially by the railroad opposite the oaks, sheds pollen.");  . April 11, 1856 ("Seek out some young and lusty-growing alder (as on the 9th), with clear, shining, and speckled bark, in the warmest possible position,. . .Some will be in full bloom above, while their extremities are comparatively dead, as if struck with a palsy in the winter. Soon will come a rude wind and shake their pollen copiously over the water"); April 15, 1856 ("What I think the Alnus serrulata (?) will shed pollen to-day on the edge of Catbird Meadow. Is that one at Brister’s Spring and at Depot Brook crossing? Also grows on the west edge of Trillium Wood."); July 7, 1856 ("I see a difference now between the alder leaves near Island and edge of meadow westward, on Hill; the former slightly downy beneath, the latter (apparently Alnus serrulata) green and smooth but yet not pointed at base");  July 15, 1857 ("Two woodcocks in the shady alder marsh at Well Meadow  . . . go off with a whistling flight."); July 30, 1853 ( I was correct about the alders. The incana has a rounder leaf ; the other is more oblong and is quite smooth beneath") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Alders

Contending sparrows   

on the railroad fence – bay-wings

singing the same strain.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, A bay-wing on the railroad fence sings

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

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-560413

Red maple in bloom lightly tingeing the landscape as becomes the season.

May 7.

Our principal rain this spring was April 28th, 29th, and 30th, and again, May 3d and 4th . . . 

P. M. — To Cliffs. The causeways being flooded, I have to think before I set out on my walk how I shall get back across the river. 

The earliest flowers might be called May-day flowers. A white-throated sparrow still (in woods). Viburnum Lentago and nudum are both leafing. Cress at the Boiling Spring, one flower. As I ascend Cliff Hill, the two leaves of the Solomon's-seal now spot the forest floor, pushed up amid the dry leaves. Vaccinium Pennsylvanicum leafing.

Flowers  are self-registering indicators of fair weather. I remember how I waited for the hazel catkins to become relaxed and shed their pollen, but they delayed, till at last there came a pleasanter and warmer day and I took off my greatcoat while surveying in the woods, and then, when I went to dinner at noon, hazel catkins in full flower were dangling from the banks by the roadside and yellowed my clothes with their pollen. If man is thankful for the serene and warm day, much more are the flowers. 

From the Cliffs I again admire the flood, — the now green hills rising out of it. It is dark-blue, clay, slate, and light-blue, as you stand with regard to the sun. With the sun high on one side it is a dirty or clayey slate; directly in front, covered with silvery sparkles far to the right or north, dark-blue; farther to the southwest, light-blue.

At sunset across the flooded meadow to Nawshawtuct. The water becoming calm. The sun just disappearing as I reach the hilltop, and the horizon's edge appears with distinctness. As the twilight approaches, the mountains assume a deeper blue. 

As yet the aspect of the forest at a distance is not changed from its winter appearance, except where the maple-tops in blossom in low lands tinge it red. A spreading red maple in bloom, seen against a favorable background, as water looking down from a hillside,  presenting not a dense mass of color but an open, graceful and ethereal top of light crimson or scarlet, not too obvious and staring, slightly tingeing the landscape as becomes the season.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 7, 1854


I have to think before I set out on my walk how I shall get back across the river. See April 29, 1860 ("I had to pause a moment and cipher it out in my mind")

A spreading red maple in bloom ... presenting . . .an open, graceful and ethereal top of light crimson or scarlet, . . . slightly tingeing the landscape as becomes the season. See May 1, 1856 ("It is the red maple’s reign now,. . . you see dimly defined crescents of bright brick red above and amid a maze of ash-colored branches.”); April 26, 1855 ("The blossoms of the red maple..  . .  are now most generally conspicuous and handsome scarlet crescents over the swamps. “);  April 28, 1855 ("The red maples, now in bloom, are quite handsome at a distance over the flooded meadow . . . The abundant wholesome gray of the trunks and stems beneath surmounted by the red or scarlet crescents.”); April 24, 1857 ("I see the now red crescents of the red maples in their prime . . . above the gray stems.") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Red Maple

The sun just disappearing as I reach the hilltop . . .the horizon's edge appears with distinctness . . .the mountains assume a deeper blue. See June 2, 1852 ("Now I have reached the hill top above the fog at a quarter to five, about sunrise, and all around me is a sea of fog, level and white, reaching nearly to the top of this hill, only the tops of a few high hills appearing as distant islands in the main. It resembles nothing so much as the ocean."); August 2, 1853 ("Sundown. — To Nawshawtuct. "); December 10, 1856 (" See the sun set from the side of Nawshawtuct, and make haste to the post-office with the red sky over my shoulder.")  See also March 29, 1853 ("A pleasant short voyage is that to the Leaning Hemlocks on the Assabet, just round the Island under Nawshawtuct Hill . . .  This is a favorite voyage for ladies to make, down one stream and up the other, plucking the lilies by the way and landing on the Island, and concluding with a walk on Nawshawtuct Hill..")