The river fallen some nine inches notwithstanding the melted snow.

 

April 6.

April 6, 2021

Am surprised to find the river fallen some nine inches notwithstanding the melted snow.

But I read in Blodget that the equivalent in water is about one tenth. Say one ninth in this case, and you have one and one third inches, and this falling on an unfrozen surface, the river at the same time falling from a height, shows why it was no more retarded (far from being absolutely raised).

There is now scarcely a button-ball to be seen on Moore's tree, where there were many a month ago. The balls have not fallen entire, but been decomposed and the seed dispersed gradually, leaving long, stringy stems and their cores dangling still.  It is the storms of February and March that disperse them.

The (are they cinnamon?) sparrows are the finest singers I have heard yet, especially in Monroe's garden, where I see no tree sparrows. Similar but more prolonged and remarkable and loud.

 

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 6, 1861

Am surprised to find the river fallen some nine inches notwithstanding the melted snow. See April 6, 1858 ("They with whom I talk do not remember when the river was so low at this season.");April 7, 1858 ("The ground about the outmost willow at my boat's place is high and dry. . . . There is no water anywhere on these meadows now — except the one or two permanent pools — which I cannot walk through in my boots. ") Compare  April 8, 1856 ("River had risen so since yesterday I could not get under the bridge, but was obliged to find a round stick and roll my boat over the road.”) and  April 12, 1856 ("The river . . . was at its height when the snow generally was quite melted here, i. e. yesterday.")

But I read in Blodget that the equivalent in water is about one tenth. See L Blodgett, Climatology of the United States 320 (1857) ("one-tenth of the recorded depth of snow has been taken as its equivalent in water. This rule is sufficiently near to accuracy for any general purpose,")

There is now scarcely a button-ball to be seen on Moore's tree, where there were many a month ago. See February 28. 1861 ("The buttonwood seed has apparently scarcely begun to fall yet — only two balls under one tree, but they loose and broken. [Almost entirely fallen March 7th, leaving the dangling stems and bare receptacles.]") Note, per Wikipedia ("The Buttonball Tree is an exceptionally large American sycamore (Platanus occidentalis) located in Sunderland, Massachusetts. The nickname "buttonball" has been used for all like trees")

Air full of golden robins.

May 14, 2016

May 14 
Air full of golden robins. Their loud clear note betrays them as soon as they arrive. 

Yesterday and to-day I see half a dqzen tortoises on a rail, — their first appearance in numbers. 

Catbird amid shrub oaks. 

Female red-wing. 

Flood tells me he saw cherry-birds on the 12th of April in Monroe's garden. 

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 14, 1856

Air full of golden robins. Their loud clear note betrays them as soon as they arrive. See May 13, 1855 ("The gold robin, just come, is heard in all parts of the village. I see both male and female.”) See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Golden Robin

I see half a dqzen tortoises on a rail, — their first appearance in numbers. See May 14, 1857 ("At the temporary brush fence pond . . . I see, within a dozen rods along its shore, one to three rods from edge, thirteen wood tortoises on the grass, at 4 P. M. this cloudy afternoon.")

Catbird amid shrub oaks. See May 13, 1853 ("Stood listening to a catbird, sounding a good way off. Was surprised to detect the singer within a rod and a half on a low twig, the ventriloquist. Should not have believed it was he, if I had not seen the movements of his throat, corresponding to each note, -looking at this near singer whose notes sounded so far away.")

Female red-wing. See May 8, 1854 (“A female red-wing. I have not seen any before.”); May 13, 1855 ("I hear from a female red-wing that peculiar rich screwing warble.”);  May 13, 1860 ("Red wings are evidently busy building their nests. They are sly and anxious, the females. about the button-bushes.");  May 14, 1853 ("The still dead-looking willows and button-bushes are alive with red-wings, now perched on a yielding twig, now pursuing a female swiftly over the meadow, now darting across the stream.") See also  A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Red-wing in Spring

Flood tells me he saw cherry-birds. See March 20, 1858  ("I see a flock of cherry-birds with that alert, chieftain-like look . . .They have been seen a week or two."); See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Cherry-bird (cedar waxwing)

May 14. See A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, May 14.

Loud golden robins –

their clear note betrays them as 

soon as they arrive. 

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Air full of golden robins.

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-560514