The river has been frozen solidly for seven weeks.

February 27

P. M. — Up Assabet. 

Am surprised to see how the ice lasts on the river. 

It but just begins to be open for a foot or two at Merrick’s, and you see the motion of the stream. It has overflowed the ice for many rods a few feet in width. It has been tight even there (and of course everywhere else on the main stream, and on North Branch except at Loring’s Brook and under stone bridge) since January 25th, and elsewhere on the main stream since January 7th, as it still is. 

That is, we may say that the river has been frozen solidly for seven weeks. 

On the 25th I saw a load of wood drawn by four horses up the middle of the river above Fair Haven Pond.  On that day, the 25th, they were cutting the last of Baker’s the greater part of it last winter, and this was the wood they were hauling off. 

I see many birch scales, freshly blown over the snow. They are falling all winter. 

Found, in the snow in E. Hosmer’s meadow, a gray rabbit’s hind leg, freshly left there, perhaps by a fox.


H. D. Thoreau, Journal, February 27, 1856

The river has been frozen solidly for seven weeks. ... See February 12, 1856 ("forty three days of uninterrupted cold weather, . . .twenty-five days the snow was sixteen inches deep in open land!!”) Compare February 27, 1852 ("the North Branch, is open near Tarbell's and Harrington's, where I walked to-day, and, flowing with full tide bordered with ice on either side, sparkles in the clear, cool air, This restless and now swollen stream has burst its icy fetters. . . “); February 17, 1857 ("The river is fairly breaking up . . . It is as open as the 3d of April last year, at least."); February 27, 1857 ("The river has skimmed over again in many places.").

Just below this bridge begins an otter track

February 22.

—To Assabet stone bridge and home on river. 

It is a pleasant and warm afternoon, and the snow is melting. Yet the river is still perfectly closed (as it has been for many weeks), both against Merrick’s and in the Assabet, excepting directly under this upper stone bridge and probably at mouth of Loring’s Brook. 

I am surprised that the warm weather within ten days has not caused the river to open at Merrick’s, but it was too thick to be melted. 

Now first, the snow melting and the ice beginning to soften, I see those slender grayish-winged insects creeping with closed wings over the snow-clad ice, — Perla (?) on all parts of  the river. Have seen none before, this winter. 

Just below this bridge begins an otter track, several days old yet very distinct, which I trace half a mile down the river. In the snow less than an inch deep, on the ice, each foot makes a track three inches wide, apparently enlarged in melting. The clear interval, sixteen inches; the length occupied by the four feet, fourteen inches. It looks as if some one had dragged a round timber down the middle of the river a day or two since, which bounced as it went.

There is now a crack running down the middle of the river, and it is slightly elevated there, owing, probably, to the increasing temperature.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, February 22, 1856

An otter track, several days old . . . which I trace half a mile down the river. . . . looks as if some one had dragged a round timber down the middle of the river a day or two since, which bounced as it went. See February 20, 1856 (" See a broad and distinct otter-trail, made last night or yesterday. . . .Commonly seven to nine or ten inches wide, and tracks of feet twenty to twenty-four apart; but sometimes there was no track of the feet for twenty-five feet, frequently for six. . ."); March 6, 1856 ("On the rock this side the Leaning Hemlocks, is the track of an otter.”);April 6, 1855 ("it reminds me of an otter, which however I have never seen."); February 20, 1855 (among the quadrupeds of Concord, the otter is "very rare.”); February 4, 1855 ("See this afternoon a very distinct otter-track by the Rock”); January 30, 1854 ("How retired an otter manages to live! He grows to be four feet long without any mortal getting a glimpse of him”).

The snow of the 28th is driving like steam over the fields, drifting into the roads.

January 30.

8 A. M. -- It has just begun to snow, — those little round dry pellets like shot.  Stops snowing before noon, not having amounted to anything.

As I walked above the old stone bridge on the 27th, I saw where the river had recently been open under the wooded bank on the west side; and recent sawdust and shavings from the pail-factory, and also the ends of saplings and limbs of trees which had been bent down by the ice, were frozen in. In some places some water stood above the ice, and as I stood there, I saw and heard it gurgle up through a crevice and spread over the ice. This was the influence of Loring’s Brook, far above.

P. M. -- Measure to see what difference there is in the depth of the snow . . .

. . .  The Andromeda calyculata is now quite covered, and I walk on the crust over an almost uninterrupted plain there; only a few blueberries and last, I break through. It is so light beneath that the crust breaks there in great cakes under my feet, and immediately falls about a foot, making a great hole, so that once pushing my way through — for regularly stepping is out of the question in the weak places —makes a pretty good path. 

By the railroad against Walden I hear the lisping of a chickadee, and see it on a sumach. It repeatedly hops to a bunch of berries, takes one, and, hopping to a more horizontal twig, places it under one foot and hammers at it with its bill. The snow is strewn with the berries under its foot, but I can see no shells of the fruit. Perhaps it clears off the crimson only. Some of the bunches are very large and quite upright there still. 

Again, I suspect that on meadows the snow is not so deep and has a firmer crust. In an ordinary storm the depth of the snow will be affected by a wood twenty or more rods distant, or as far as the wood is a fence.

There is a strong wind this afternoon from northwest, and the snow of the 28th is driving like steam over the fields, drifting into the roads. On the railroad causeway it lies in perfectly straight and regular ridges a few feet apart, northwest and southeast. It is dry and scaly, like coarse bran. Now that there is so much snow, it slopes up to the tops of the walls on both sides. 

What a difference between life in the city and in the country at present, — between walking in Washington Street, threading your way between countless sledges and travellers, over the discolored snow, and crossing Walden Pond, a spotless field of snow surrounded by woods, whose intensely blue shadows and your own are the only objects. What a solemn silence reigns here!

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, January 30, 1856

It has just begun to snow, — those little round dry pellets like shot. Stops snowing before noon, not having amounted to anything. See December 14, 1859 (" . . . Also there is the pellet or shot snow, which consists of little dry spherical pellets the size of robin-shot. This, I think, belongs to cold weather. Probably never have much of it.")
 
sawdust and shavings from the pail-factory. . . .   See “Pail-stuff"

By the railroad against Walden I hear the lisping of a chickadee, and see it on a sumach. See Janaury 30, 1854("As we walk up the river, a little flock of chickadees flies to us from a wood-side fifteen rods off, and utters their lively day day day,.) See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Chickadee in Winter 

What a solemn silence reigns here! See January 21, 1853 ("The silence rings; it is musical and thrills me. A night in which the silence was audible."); August 11, 1853 ("What shall we name this season? — this very late afternoon, or very early evening, this season of the day most favorable for reflection, . . ..The few sounds now heard, far or near, are delicious. Each sound has a broad and deep relief of silence."); August 2, 1854 ("As I go up the hill, surrounded by its shadow, while the sun is setting, I am soothed by the delicious stillness of the evening, . . . .It is the first silence I have heard for a month")

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau,  January 30

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 ©  2009-2023

The fruit stems of the dogwood still hold on

January 27

I have just sawed a wheel an inch and three quarters thick off the end of (apparently) a stick of red oak in my pile. I count twenty-nine rings, and about the same number of rings, or divisions of some kind, with more or less distinctness, in the bark, which is about a quarter of an inch thick. 

Is not the whole number of rings contained in the bark of all trees which have a bark externally smooth? 

This stick has two centres of growth, each a little one side of the middle. I trace one easily to a limb which was cut off close to the tree about three and a half inches above the lower side of the section. The two centres are one inch apart on the lower side, two inches and five eighths on the upper side. 

There are three complete circles to the main one on the lower side, and ten on the upper side, before they coalesce; hence it was seven years closing up through an inch and three quarters of height. 

There is a rough ridge, confined to the bark only and about a quarter of an inch  high, extending from the crotch diagonally down the tree, apparently to a point over the true centre of growth. 

P. M.—Walk on the river from the old stone to Derby’s Bridge. 

It is open a couple of rods under the stone bridge, but not a rod below it, and also for forty rods below the mouth of Loring’s Brook, along the west side, probably because this is a mill-stream. 

The only other open places within the limits mentioned yesterday are in one or two places close under the bank, and concealed by it, where warm springs issue, the river, after freezing, having shrunk and the ice settled a foot or eighteen inches there, so that you can see water over its edge. 

The white maple at Derby’s Bridge measures fifteen feet in circumference at ground, including apparently a very large sucker, and ten feet five inches, at four feet above the ground, not including sucker, there free. 

The lodging snow of January 13th, just a fortnight ago, still adheres in deep and conspicuous ridges to large exposed trees, too stubborn to be shaken by the wind, showing from which side the storm came.

The fruit stems of the dogwood still hold on, and a little fruit. 

See what I think are bass nuts on the snow on the river, at Derby’s railroad bridge, probably from up-stream.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, January 27, 1856

Open forty rods below the mouth of Loring’s Brook, along the west side, probably because this is a mill-stream. See January 26, 1856 ("[The river is not open], excepting the small space against Merrick’s below the Rock (now closed), since January 7th, when it closed at the Hubbard Bath, or nearly three weeks, —a long time, methinks, for it to be frozen so solidly.");  January 30, 1856 ("As I walked above the old stone bridge on the 27th, I saw where the river had recently been open under the wooded bank on the west side; and recent sawdust and shavings from the pail-factory, and also the ends of saplings and limbs of trees which had been bent down by the ice, were frozen in. In some places some water stood above the ice, and as I stood there, I saw and heard it gurgle up through a crevice and spread over the ice. This was the influence of Loring’s Brook, far above.”);  February 1, 1856 ("This has been a memorable January for snow and cold . . . The river has been closed up from end to end, with the exception of one or two insignificant openings on a few days . . . We have completely forgotten the summer. There has been no January thaw"); February 22, 1856 ([T]he river is still perfectly closed (as it has been for many weeks), both against Merrick’s and in the Assabet, excepting directly under this upper stone bridge and probably at mouth of Loring’s Brook. I am surprised that the warm weather within ten days has not caused the river to open at Merrick’s, but it was too thick to be melted); February 27, 1856 (Am surprised to see how the ice lasts on the river. It but just begins to be open for a foot or two at Merrick’s, and you see the motion of the stream. It has been tight even there (and of course everywhere else on the main stream, and on North Branch except at Loring’s Brook and under stone bridge) since January 25th…That is, we may say that the river has been frozen solidly for seven weeks.). See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Ice-Out

Bass nuts.  See April 8, 1856 ("Found beneath the surface, on the sphagnum, near wrinkled shells, a little like nutmegs, perhaps bass nuts, collected after a freshet by mice! ") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Basswood

January 27.  See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  January 27

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  The fruit stems of the dogwood still hold on

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 © 2009-2025