A Book of the Seasons: Savory-leaved aster (Aster Linariifolius/Diplopappus)

South of the lighthouse

the savory-leaved aster

on a steep hillside.

That common rigid

narrow-leaved faint-purplish

aster in dry woods.

July 7.  Just south of the lighthouse near the bank on a steep hillside, the savory-leaved aster (Diplopappus linariifolius) and mouse-ear (Gnaphalium plantaginifolium) form a dense sward, being short and thick; the aster not yet out. July 7, 1855

July 26. Diplopappus linariifolius. Aster dumosus. July 26, 1854

July 28. Aster linariifolius.  July 28, 1853

July 29. That common rigid narrow-leaved faint-purplish aster in dry woods by shrub oak path, Aster linariifolius of Bigelow, but it is not savory leaved. I do not find it in Gray. July 29, 1852

August 3. Savory-leaved aster.  August 3, 1858 

August 4. The yellow Bethlehem-star still, and the yellow gerardia, and a bluish "savory-leaved aster."  August 4, 1851 

August 16. Diplopappus linariifolius, apparently several days. August 16, 1856 

August 22.  The savory-leaved aster (Diplopappus linariifolius) out; how long?  August 22, 1859

August 30. As I went along from the Minott house to the Bidens Brook, I was quite bewildered by the beauty and variety of the asters, now in their prime there – A. lævis (large and handsome with various leaves), patens, linariifolius, etc. Why so many asters and goldenrods now? The sun has shone on the earth, and the goldenrod is his fruit. The stars, too, have shone on it, and the asters are their fruit. August 30, 1853

September 1. D. linariifolius, hardly noticed. September 1, 1856

September 2. Diplopappus linariifolius, quite common . . . D. linariifolius, pale bluish-purple (Some, outdoors, have a lilac or violet tint.) . . . The D. linariifolius is interesting, with its commonly single flower, with very broad rays turned backward, or handsomer still when it has fifteen or twenty heads crowded together. September 2, 1853

September 7. At Brattleboro, Vt . . .The Solidago Canadensis, and the smooth three-ribbed one, and nemoralis, etc., the helianthus (apparently decapetalus), and Aster or Diplopappus linariifolius, Vitis cordifolius (?) (now beginning to be ripe) are quite common along the bank. September 7, 1856

September 10. Diplopappus linariifolius and Aster undulatus apparently now in prime. September 10, 1854

September 18.  – By boat to Conantum, barberrying. Diplopappus linariifolius in prime. September 18, 1856

September 24. D. linariifolius, in prime, abundant.  September 24, 1856

September 29. Diplopappus linariifolius, Aster undulatus, and a few small ones September 29,1853 

September 30. We then took the path to Clematis Brook on the north of Mt. Misery, where we found a few of the Diplopappus linariifolius (savory-leaved aster) and one or two small white (bushy ?) asters, also A. undulatus September 30, 1852

October 8. D. linariifolius, apparently nearly done  October 8, 1856

October 10.  Pulling up some Diplopappus linariifolius, now done, I find many bright-purple shoots, a half to three quarters of an inch long, freshly put forth underground and ready to turn upward and form new plants in the spring. October 10, 1858 

October 12. With man all is uncertainty. He does not confidently look forward to another spring. But examine the root of the  savory-leaved aster, and you will find the new shoots, fair purple shoots, which are to curve upward and bear the next year’s flowers, already grown half an inch or more in earth. Nature is confident. October 12, 1858

October 16.  Many Diplopappus linariifolius are gone to seed, and yellowish globes. Such are the stages in the year's decline. The flowers are at the mercy of the frosts.   October 16, 1859

October 20. Many plants which in the summer show a few red or scarlet leaves at length are all yellow only . . . Diplopappus linariifolius in shade yellow, in sun purple last of October  October 20, 1858

October 22.  I see the small narrow leaves of the Aster dumosus and also the yet finer ones of the Diplopappus linariifolius in wood-paths, turned a clear light-yellow.  October 22, 1858

October 23. One Diplopappus linariifolius in bloom, its leaves all yellow or red. This and A. undulatus the asters seen to-day.  October 23, 1853

October 25. Aster longifolius in low ground (a few). This and the Diplopappus linariifolius, and, above all,  A. undulatus, the only flowers of the kind seen this week. (Afterwards A. puniceus, Tradescanti, and one lævis!)  October 25, 1853

November 7.  The Diplopappus linariifolius, which was yellow in the shade, in open and sunny places is purple.  November 7, 1858

December 26.  After snow, rain, and hail yesterday and last night, we have this morning quite a glaze, there being at last an inch or two of crusted snow on the ground, the most we have had . . .Weeds in the fields and the wood-paths are the most interesting. Here are asters, savory-leaved, whose flat imbricated calyxes, three quarters of an inch over, are surmounted and inclosed in a perfectly transparent icebutton, like a glass knob, through which you see the reflections of the brown calyx. December 26, 1855 

Aster linariifolius and  Diplopappus linariifolius — Savory-leaved aster, Flax-leaved stiff-aster , Stiff-leafed Aster, Sandpaper Aster or Sandpaper Starwort (now classified as  Lonactis linariifolia) 

See also

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Asters in August

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Savory-leaved aster

 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

A Book of the Seasons: Pine-sap and Indian-pipe

I would make a chart of our life,

know why just this circle of creatures completes the world.

Henry Thoreau, April 18, 1852

There is not only the tobacco-pipe,

but pine-sap. 

July 29, 1853

July 30, 2023

July 8.  Edith Emerson says she has seen the pine-sap this year in Concord.  July 8, 1857

July 22.  Monotropa uniflora, Indian-pipe.  July 22, 1852

July 23. The tobacco-pipe in damp woods. July 23, 1851

July 24.  Tobacco-pipe much blackened, out a long time. July 24, 1856

July 29.  Hypopitys lanuginosa, American pine-sap, just pushing up, — false beech-drops. Gray says from June to August. It is cream-colored or yellowish under the pines in Hubbard's Wood Path. Some near the fence east of the Close. A plant related to the tobacco-pipe. Remarkable this doubleness in nature, — not only that nature should be composed of just these individuals, but that there should be so rarely or never an individual without its kindred, — its cousin. It is allied to something else. There is not only the tobacco-pipe, but pine-sap. July 29, 1853

 July 30. The tobacco-pipe has also pushed up there amid the dry leaves in the shade. It is abundant now, and here. Both stem and flowers and scales are a pure and delicate crystalline white  What to name it? Sheathed with delicate white scales. It reminded me of a maiden in her robes of purity who has always been nurtured in a shady and vaul-like seclusion, a nun of spotless purity, a daughter of Tellus and Cælum too, making her entrance into the world. Pushing aside the doorway of dry leaves, three sisters of various heights issue from their hidden convent and stand side by side in the presence of the light. We are surprised to see such pure robes come from the bowels of the earth. Yet this white and crystal-line purity smacks of the cellar and shade. They come forth to be proved, and stand abashed in presence of the light, with hanging heads and faces toward the ground under their pure white hoods and capes, striving at first to conceal their nakedness and tenderness. A few loose, scanty, but beautiful, pearly sheaths alone invested them, and the broader capes of their hoods. The sisters then came forth of spotless purity,, but soon, exposed to light and air  their virtue dried black. I was surprised to hear that this was called the tobacco-pipe! Their untried virtue cannot long stand the light and air. These and pine-sap the plants the dog-days (?) produce.  July 30, 1853

July 30.  I have seen a few new fungi within a week. The tobacco-pipes are still pushing up white amid the dry leaves, sometimes lifting a canopy of leaves with them four or five inches. July 30, 1854

July 31.  To Flint’s Pond . . . I have smelled fungi in the thick woods for a week, though they are not very common. I see tobacco-pipes now in the path.  July 31, 1858

August 10. I see many tobacco-pipes, now perhaps in their prime, if not a little late, and hear of pine-sap. The Indian pipe, though coming with the fungi and suggesting, no doubt, a close relation to them, — a sort of connecting link between flowers and fungi, — is a very interesting flower, and will bear a close inspection when fresh. The whole plant has a sweetish, earthy odor, though Gray says it is inodorous. I see them now on the leafy floor of this oak wood, in families of twelve to thirty sisters of various heights,—from two to eight inches,— as close together as they can stand, the youngest standing close up to the others, all with faces yet modestly turned downwards under their long hoods. Here is a family of about twenty-five within a diameter of little more than two inches, lifting the dry leaves for half their height in a cylinder about them. They generally appear bursting up through the dry leaves, which, elevated around, may serve to prop them. Springing up in the shade with so little color, they look the more fragile and delicate. They have very delicate pinkish half-naked stems with a few semitransparent crystalline-white scales for leaves, and from the sinuses at the base of the petals without (when their heads are drooping) more or less dark purple is reflected, like the purple of the arteries seen on a nude body. They appear not to flower only when upright. Gray says they are upright in fruit. They soon become black-specked, even before flowering.  August 10, 1858

August 13.  Hypopytis abundantly out (how long ?), apparently a good while, in that long wood-path on the left side, under the oak wood, before you begin to rise, going from the river end. Very little indeed is yet erect, and that which is not is apparently as forward as the rest. Not generally quite so high as the Monotropa uniflora which grows with it. I see still in their midst the dry upright brown spikes of last year’s seed-vessels. August 13, 1858

August 14.  Hypopitys, just beyond the last large (two-stemmed) chestnut at Saw Mill Brook, about done. Apparently a fungus like plant. It erects itself in seed. August 14, 1856.

August 23.  See an abundance of pine-sap on the right of Pine-sap Path. It is almost all erect, some eight to nine inches high, and all effete there. Some stems are reddish. It lifts the leaves with it like the Indian-pipe, but is not so delicate as that. The Indian-pipe is still pushing up. August 23, 1858

August 27.  Tobacco-pipe still.  August 27, 1856

August 31. Tobacco-pipe (Monotropa uniflora) in Spring Swamp Path.  August 31, 1851

August 31. The monotropa is still pushing up. August 31, 1858 

September 1. P. M. — To Saw Mill Brook and Flint's Pond . . . See, I think, my first tobacco-pipe this afternoon, now that they are about done, and have seen no pine-sap this year, abundant as both the above were last year. Like fungi, these plants are apparently scarce in a dry year, so that you might at first think them rare plants. This is a phenomenon of drought. September 1, 1859

September 9. C. brings me a small red hypopitys. It has a faint sweet, earthy, perhaps checkerberry, scent, like that sweet mildewy fragrance of the earth in spring. September 9, 1857

September 21. Came through that thick white pine wood on the east of the spruce swamp. This is a very dense white pine grove . . . Under this dense shade, the red-carpeted ground is almost bare of vegetation and is dark at noon. There grow . . .on the low west side and also the east side, an abundance of tobacco-pipe, which has begun to turn black at the tip of the petals and leaves.  September 21, 1857

September 23. I see yellow pine-sap, in the woods just east of where the beeches used to stand, just done, but the red variety is very common and quite fresh generally there. September 23, 1857

September 23. Red pine-sap by north side of Yew Path some ten rods east of yew, not long done. The root of the freshest has a decided checkerberry scent, and for a long time — a week after — in my chamber, the bruised plant has a very pleasant earthy sweetness. September 23, 1860

October 6.  Going through Ebby Hubbard's woods . . . I see a great quantity of hypopitys, now all sere, along the path in the woods beyond. Call it Pine-Sap Path. It seems to have been a favorable season for it. It was evidently withered earlier than the tobacco-pipe, which is still pretty white! October 6, 1857

October 14. On the top of Ball’s Hill, nearly half-way its length, the red pine-sap, quite fresh, apparently not long in bloom, the flower recurved. As last year, I suspect that this variety is later than the yellowish one, of which I have seen none for a long time. The last, in E. Hubbard’s wood, is all brown and withered. This is a clear and distinct deep-red from the ground upward, all but the edges and tips of the petals, and is very handsome amid the withered lower leaves, as it were the latest flower of the year. The roots have not only a sweet earthy, but decidedly checkerberry, scent. At length this fungus-like plant bursts red-ripe, stem and all, from the ground. Its deep redness reminds me of the deeper colors of the western sky after the sun has set, — a sort of afterglow in the flowery year. I suspect that it is eminently an autumnal flower.  October 14, 1858

November 25. Methinks there has been more pine-sap than usual the past summer. I never saw a quarter part so much. It stands there withered in dense brown masses, six or eight inches high, partly covered with dead leaves. The tobacco-pipes are a darker brown. November 25, 1857

July 30, 2023

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Pine-sap and Indian-pipe

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

Notes.  

We’ve been seeing numerous clusters of both ghost plant (Monotropa uniflora) and yellow pine-sap (Hypopitys monotropa). These plants, which are often mistaken for fungi, lack chlorophyll and don’t rely on photosynthesis. Instead, both are mycotrophs, meaning that they parasitize mycorrhizal fungi, and in this way, indirectly, pull energy from the roots of the trees. Although they’re similar looking, if you inspect their flowers closely, you’ll see that ghost plant has singular flowers, whereas pine-sap produces cascades of flowers. Pine-sap also has fuzz on its stems, and ghost plant does not. (Most of the time ghost plant is also much more pure white than pine-sap…but that isn’t a reliable distinction.) ~northernwoodlandsmagazine #ThisWeekintheWoods July 27. 2023

The red, yellow (and other “species” of pine sap) are often lumped together as Monotropa hypopitys, described generally as a saprophytic, red, pink, lavender, or yellow plant with several vase-like, nodding flowers on a downy, scaly stem; stem and flowers colored alike, with  autumn-flowering plants being red color, and early-flowering plants yellow.  Like Indian-pipe, pine-saps are mycotrophs, receiving nutrients via fungal mycelia rather than through photosynthesis. ~ GoBotany, Wildflower.org

"Pine drops" (Pterospora andromedea).See First Sighting Of 'Pine-Drops' Plant In Massachusetts In Berkshires; MassWildlife; U.S. Forest Service.

Berrying to Brooks Clark's.

July 29. 

P. M. — Berrying to Brooks Clark's. 

Rich-weed, how long? 

Amaranthus hypochondriacus, apparently some days, with its interesting spotted leaf, lake beneath, and purple spike; amid the potatoes.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, July 29, 1854


Rich-weed, how long? See July 28, 1856 ("Richweed at Brown's oak, several days (since 16th; say 22d).")

Amaranthus hypochondriacus, See September 14, 1852 ("Amaranthus hypochondriacus, prince's-feather, with 'bright red-purple flowers' and sanguine stem")

July 29. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, July 29

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 ©  2009-2024

Looking for the Vaccinium Pennsylvanicum berries.

July 29. 

P. M. — To Pine Hill, looking for the Vaccinium Pennsylvanicum berries. 

I find plenty of bushes, but these bear very sparingly. They appear to bear but one or two years before they are overgrown. Also they probably love a cool atmosphere, for they bear annually on mountains, as Monadnock. Where the woods have been cut a year or two they have put forth fresh shoots of a livelier green. 

The V. vacillans berries are in dense clusters, raceme-like, as huckleberries are not. 

I see nowadays young martins perched on the dead tops of high trees; also young swallows on the telegraph wire. 

In the Chinese novel “ Ju-Kiao-Li, or The Two Fair Cousins,” I find in a motto to a chapter (quoted):

“He who aims at success should be continually on his guard against a thousand accidents. How many preparations are necessary before the sour plum begins to sweeten! . . . But if supreme happiness was to be attained in the space of an hour, of what use would be in life the noblest sentiments ?” (Page 227.)

Also these verses on page 230: —

“Nourished by the study of ten thousand dififerent works,
The pen in hand, one is equal to the gods.
 Let not humility take its rank amongst virtues:
Genius never yields the palm that belongs to it.” 

Again, page 22, vol. ii: — 

“If the spring did not announce its reign by the return of the leaves,
The moss, with its greenish tints, would find favor in men’s eyes.”

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, July 29, 1858 

Looking for the Vaccinium Pennsylvanicum berries. See note to July 16, 1857(“I hear of the first early blueberries brought to market.”)

The V. vacillans berries are in dense clusters, raceme-like, as huckleberries are not. See July 29,, 1859 (“Vaccinium vacillans begin to be pretty thick and some huckleberries.”); July 31, 1856 (“How thick the berries — low blackberries, Vaccinium vacillans, and huckleberries — on the side of Fair Haven Hill! ”)

I see nowadays young martins perched on the dead tops of high trees. See July 14, 1856 (“See and hear martins twittering on the elms by riverside.”); July 28, 1859 ("Saw young martins being fed on a bridge-rail yesterday.")

Young swallows on the telegraph wire. See July 5, 1854 ("One hundred and nine swallows on telegraph-wire at bridge within eight rods, and others flying about."); July 12, 1852 ("I observed this morning a row of several dozen swallows perched on the telegraph-wire by the bridge, and ever and anon a part of them would launch forth as with one consent, circle a few moments over the water or meadow, and return to the wire again."); July 12, 1859 (" They take their broods to the telegraph-wire for an aerial perch, where they teach them to fly.")

Note on blueberries: The difference between the often confused Huckleberry (Gaylussacia) and Lowbush Blueberry (Vaccinium angustifolium and vacillans) is inside the berry. Huckleberries have 10 hardened seeds inside each berry, compared the numerous softer seeds in the lowbush blueberry. The plants also differ in the texture of their stems. Huckleberry stems are smooth and lowbush blueberry are "warty". The two species of Lowbush Blueberry (angustifolium and vacillans) are distinguished by their leaves. Angustifolium has leaves which are a uniform green above and below; vacillans has leaves which are noticeably more pale beneath. ` Voyageur Country

July 29. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, July 29

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 ©  2009-2024

A distant view of the possible

July 29 

Wednesday. I noticed there [Telos Lake] Aralia racemosa, and Aster macrophyllus in bloom, with bluish rays and quite fragrant (!), like some medicinal herb, so that I doubted at first if it were that. . . . 

I found on the edge of this clearing the Cirsium muticum, or swamp thistle, abundantly in bloom. I think we scared up a black partridge just beyond. . . . 

I am interested in an indistinct prospect, a distant view, a mere suggestion often, revealing an almost wholly new world to me. I rejoice to get, and am apt to present, a new view. But I find it impossible to present my view to most people. 

In effect, it would seem that they do not wish to take a new view in any case. Heat lightning flashes, which reveal a distant horizon to our twilight eyes. But my fellows simply assert that it is not broad day, which everybody knows, and fail to perceive the phenomenon at all. 

I am willing to pass for a fool in my often desperate, perhaps foolish, efforts to persuade them to lift the veil from off the possible and future, which they hold down with both their hands, before their eyes. 

The most valuable communication or news consists of hints and suggestions. When a truth comes to be known and accepted, it begins to be bad taste to repeat it. Every individual constitution is a probe employed in a new direction, and a wise man will attend to each one's report.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, July 29, 1857

See The Maine Woods (“Wednesday, July 29. When we awoke it had done raining, though it was still cloudy. . . . We decided to cross the lake at once, before breakfast, or while we could; and before starting I took the bearing of the shore which we wished to strike, S. S. E. about three miles distant . . . After coasting eastward along this shore a mile or two, we breakfasted on a rocky point, the first convenient place that offered. It was well enough that we crossed thus early, for the waves now ran quite high, . . . Leaving a spacious bay, a northeasterly prolongation of Chamberlain Lake, on our left, we entered through a short strait into a small lake a couple of miles over, called on the map Telasinis, but the Indian had no distinct name for it, and thence into Telos Lake, which he called Paytaywecomgomoc, or Burnt-Ground Lake. . . . We landed on a rocky point on the northeast side, to look at some red pines (Pinus resinosa), the first we had noticed, and get some cones, for our few which grow in Concord do not bear any. The outlet from the lake into the East Branch of the Penobscot is an artificial one, and it was not very apparent where it was exactly . . . Here for the first time we found the raspberries really plenty, — that is, on passing the height of land between the Allegash and the East Branch of the Penobscot ; the same was true of the blueberries. . . .Telos Lake, the head of the St. John on this side, and Webster Pond, the head of the East Branch of the Penobscot, are only about a mile apart, and they are connected by a ravine, in which but little digging was required to make the water of the former, which is the highest, flow into the latter. . .Following a moist trail through the forest, we reached the head of Webster Pond about the same time with the Indian, notwithstanding the velocity with which he moved, our route being the most direct. The Indian name of Webster Stream, of which this pond is the source, is, according to him, Madunkchunk, i. e., Height of Land, and of the pond, Madunkchunk-gamooc, or Height of Land Pond. The latter was two or three miles long. We passed near a pine on its shore which had been splintered by lightning, perhaps the day before. This was the first proper East Branch Penobscot water that we came to. At the outlet of Webster Lake was another dam, at which we stopped and picked raspberries . . .An Indian at Oldtown had told us that we should be obliged to carry ten miles between Telos Lake on the St. John and Second Lake on the East Branch of the Penobscot . . . After this rough walking in the dark woods it was an agreeable change to glide down the rapid river in the canoe once more.. . .It was very exhilarating, and the perfection of traveling, quite unlike floating on our dead Concord River, the coasting down this inclined mirror, which was now and then gently winding, down a mountain, indeed, between two evergreen forests, edged with lofty dead white pines . . Coming to falls and rapids, our easy progress was suddenly terminated . . . This was the last of our boating for the day. . . .I saw there very fresh moose tracks, found a new goldenrod to me (perhaps Solidago thyrsoidea), and I passed one white pine log, which had lodged, in the forest near the edge of the stream, which was quite five feet in diameter at the butt. . . .Shortly after this I overtook the Indian at the edge of some burnt land, which extended three or four miles at least, beginning about three miles above Second Lake, which we were expecting to reach that night . . .It was the most wild and desolate region we had camped in, . . . The moon in her first quarter, in the fore part of the night, setting over the bare rocky hills garnished with tall, charred, and hollow stumps or shells of trees, served to reveal the desolation.”)



I noticed there Aralia racemosa. See July 31, 1857 ("I also saw here, or soon after, the red cohosh berries, ripe, (for the first time in my life); spikenard, etc..") See also  July 12, 1853 ("Spikenard, not quite yet"); July 17, 1857 ("Aralia racemosa, not in bloom") July 24, 1853 ("A spikenard just beyond the spring has already pretty large green berries, though a few floweru"); August 6, 1852 ("Aralia racemosa, how long ?"); September 4, 1856 ("Aralia racemosa berries just ripe . . . not edible. "); September 4, 1859 ("See a very large mass of spikenard berries fairly ripening, eighteen inches long.")

Aster macrophyllus in bloom, with bluish rays and quite fragrant (!) See July 22, 1852 ("The Aster macrophyllus, large-leafed, in Miles's Swamp."); See August 9, 1856 ("The flowers of A. macrophyllus are white with a very slight bluish tinge, in a coarse flat-topped corymb. Flowers nine to ten eighths of an inch in diameter."); August 26, 1856 ("Aster macrophyllus, now in its prime. It grows large and rank, two feet high. On one I count seventeen central flowers withered, one hundred and thirty in bloom, and half as many buds.") September 9, 1856 [at Brattleboro] ("High up the mountain the Aster macrophyllus")

Heat lightning flashes, which reveal a distant horizon to our twilight eyes. See June 2, 1857 ("We see the flashes called heat lightning in the north, and hear the distant thunder."); June 16, 1852 ("Heat lightning in the horizon. A sultry night.")

July 29. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, July 29

Heat lightning flashes

reveal distant horizons

to our twilight eyes.

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 ©  2009-2024

A chimney swallow’s nest.

July 29

Rhexia. Probably would be earlier if not mowed down.

What I have called Hieracium Gronovii, with three cauline leaves and without veins, has achenia like H . venosum; so I will give it up. Its radical leaves are very hairy beneath, especially along midrib. 

Another smart rain, with lightning. 

Pratt gave me a chimney swallow's nest, which he says fell down Wesson's chimney with young in it two or three days ago. As it comes to me, it is in the form of the segment of the circumference of a sphere whose diameter is three and a half inches, the segment being two plus wide, one side, of course, longer than the other. It bears a little soot on the inner side. It may have been placed against a slanting part of the chimney, or perhaps some of the outer edge is broken off. 

It is composed wholly of stout twigs, one to two inches long, one sixteenth to one eighth inch diameter, held quasi cob-fashion, so as to form a sort of basketwork one third to one half inch thick, without any lining, at least in this, but very open to the air. These twigs, which are quite knubby, seem to be of the apple, elm, and the like, and are firmly fastened together by a very conspicuous whitish semi-transparent glue, which is laid on pretty copiously, sometimes extending continuously one inch. 

It reminds me of the edible nests of the Chinese swallow. Who knows but their edibleness is due to a similar glue secreted by the bird and used still more profusely in building its nests? 

The chimney swallow is said to break off the twigs as it flies. 

Pratt says he one day walked out with Wesson, with their rifles, as far as Hunt's Bridge. Looking down stream, he saw a swallow sitting on a bush very far off, at which he took aim and fired with ball. He was surprised to see that he had touched the swallow, for it flew directly across the river toward Simon Brown's barn, always descending toward the earth or water, not being able to maintain itself; but what surprised him most was to see a second swallow come flying be hind and repeatedly strike the other with all his force beneath, so as to toss him up as often as he approached the ground and enable him to continue his flight, and thus he continued to do till they were out of sight. 

Pratt said he resolved that he would never fire at a swallow again. 

Looked at a Sharp's rifle, a Colt's revolver, a Maynard's, and a Thurber's revolver. The last fires fastest (by a steady pull), but not so smartly, and is not much esteemed.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, July 29, 1856

Rhexia. Probably would be earlier if not mowed down. See July 29, 1853 ("About these times some hundreds of men with freshly sharpened scythes make an irruption into my garden when in its rankest condition, and clip my herbs all as close as they can,"); September 18, 1854 ("Fringed gentian . . .that has been cut off by the mowers, . . . may after all be earlier.")  See also July 18, 1852 ("The petals of the rhexia have a beautiful clear purple with a violet tinge."); August 1, 1856 (" They make a splendid show, these brilliant rose-colored patches . . Yet few ever see them in this perfection, unless the haymaker who levels them, or the birds that fly over the meadow.") and  A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Rhexia Virginica (meadow-beauty)

What I have called Hieracium Gronovii , has achenia like H . venosum; so I will give it up. See October 23, 1853  ("Is it Gronovii or veiny-leaved?") and note to July 17, 1853 ("I think we have no Hieracium Gronoviis")

July 29. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, July 29

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 ©  2009-2024

A Book of the Seasons: July 29 (sailing, the color of the harvest, swallows and redwings, low water, meadow haying, blueberries, signs of autumn)

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

July 29

The sailboat is an

invention so contrary

to expectation –

easier to guide

than a horse, the wind transports

you against itself. 

July 29 1851

That common rigid

narrow-leaved faint-purplish

aster in dry woods.

July 29, 1852

First red leaves – kindred

of fruits in the harvest and

skies in the evening.

July 29, 1852

The insect that comes

for the pollen of a plant

becomes part of it.

July 29, 1853

Heat lightning flashes

reveal distant horizons

to our twilight eyes.

July 29, 1857

July 29, 2017

Another smart rain, with lightning. July 29, 1856

Dog-days and fogs. July 29, 1859

To Lincoln Bridge by railroad. Rain, more or less, by day, and more in the night. July 29. 1860

I think we scared up a black partridge just beyond. July 29, 1857

See large flocks of red-wings now, the young grown. July 29, 1859

Over these meadows the marsh hawk circles undisturbed. July 29, 1853

I see nowadays young martins perched on the dead tops of high trees; also young swallows on the telegraph wire. July 29, 1858 

The chimney swallow is said to break off the twigs as it flies. July 29, 1856

Pratt gave me a chimney swallow's nest, which he says fell down Wesson's chimney with young in it two or three days ago. July 29, 1856

It reminds me of the edible nests of the Chinese swallow. Who knows but their edibleness is due to a similar glue secreted by the bird and used still more profusely in building its nests? July 29, 1856

This sailing on salt water is something new to me. July 29, 1851

The boat is such a living creature . . . The sailboat is an admirable invention, by which you compel the wind to transport you even against itself. July 29, 1851

 It is easier to guide than a horse; the slightest pressure on the tiller suffices. July 29, 1851

I think the inventor must have been greatly surprised, as well as delighted, at the success of his experiment. July 29, 1851

It is so contrary to expectation, as if the elements were disposed to favor you. July 29, 1851

This deep, unfordable sea! but this wind ever blowing over it to transport you! July 29, 1851

The river is very nearly down to summer level now, and I notice there, among other phenomena of low water by the river, the great yellow lily pads flat on bare mud, the Ranunculus Flammula (just begun), a close but thin green matting now bare for five or six feet in width, bream nests bare and dried up, or else bare stones and sand for six or eight feet. July 29, 1859

The white lilies are generally lifted an inch or two above water by their stems; also the Utricularia vulgaris and purpurea are raised higher above the surface than usual. July 29, 1859

Rails are lodged amid the potamogetons in midstream and have not moved for ten days. July 29, 1859

Rocks unsuspected peep out and are become visible. July 29, 1859

The water milfoil (the ambiguum var. nutans), otherwise not seen, shows itself. This is observed only at lowest water. July 29, 1859

I examined some of these bream nests left dry at Cardinal Shore. These were a foot or two wide and excavated five inches deep (as I measured) in hard sand. The fishes must have worked hard to make these holes. Sometimes they are amid or in pebbles, where it is harder yet. July 29, 1859

There are now left at their bottoms, high and dry, a great many snails (Paludina decisa) young and old, some very minute. July 29, 1859

They either wash into them or take refuge there as the water goes down. I suspect they die there. July 29, 1859

The fishes really work hard at making their nests — these, the stone-heaps, etc. — when we consider what feeble means they possess. July 29, 1859

About these times some hundreds of men with freshly sharpened scythes make an irruption into my garden when in its rankest condition, and clip my herbs all as close as they can, and I am restricted to the rough hedges and worn-out fields which had little to attract them, to the most barren and worthless pastures. July 29, 1853

I know how some fields of johnswort and goldenrod look, left in the natural state, but not much about our richest fields and meadows. July 29, 1853

Most fields are so completely shorn now that the walls and fence-sides, where plants are protected, appear unusually rich. July 29, 1853

How large a proportion of flowers, for instance, are referred to and found by hedges, walls, and fences. July 29, 1853

Rhexia. Probably would be earlier if not mowed down. July 29, 1856

I know not what aspect the flowers would present if our fields and meadows were untouched for a year, if the mower were not permitted to swing his scythe there. July 29, 1853

No doubt some plants contended long in vain with these vandals, and at last withdrew from the contest. July 29, 1853

In the Poorhouse Meadow, the white orchis spike almost entirely out, some days at least.  July 29, 1853

What I have called Hieracium Gronovii, with three cauline leaves and without veins, has achenia like H . venosum; so I will give it up. Its radical leaves are very hairy beneath, especially along midrib. July 29, 1856

Aralia racemosa, and Aster macrophyllus in bloom, with bluish rays and quite fragrant (!), like some medicinal herb, so that I doubted at first if it were that. July 29, 1857  

I found on the edge of this clearing the Cirsium muticum, or swamp thistle, abundantly in bloom. July 29, 1857

Beck Stow's is much frequented by cows, which burst through the thickest bushes.  July 29, 1853

Butterflies of various colors are now more abundant than I have seen them before, especially the small reddish or coppery ones. July 29, 1853

I counted ten yesterday on a single Sericocarpus conyzoides. They were in singular harmony with the plant, as if they made a part of it. July 29, 1853 

The insect that comes after the honey or pollen of a plant is necessary to it and in one sense makes a part of it. July 29, 1853

Being constantly in motion and, as they moved, opening and closing their wings to preserve their balance, they presented a very lifesome scene. July 29, 1853

To-day I see them on the early goldenrod (Solidago strict). July 29, 1853

Bartonia tenella, how long? July 29, 1859

Rich-weed, how long? July 29, 1854

Amaranthus hypochondriacus, apparently some days, with its interesting spotted leaf, lake beneath, and purple spike; amid the potatoes. July 29, 1854

American pine-sap, just pushing up, — false beech-drops.  Gray says from June to August. It is cream-colored or yellowish under the pines in Hubbard's Wood Path. Some near the fence east of the Close. A plant related to the tobacco-pipe. July 29, 1853

Remarkable this doubleness in nature, — not only that nature should be composed of just these individuals, but that there should be so rarely or never an individual without its kindred, — its cousin. It is allied to something else. July 29, 1853

There is not only the tobacco-pipe, but pine-sap. July 29, 1853

I also see some small, umbrella-shaped (with sharp cones), shining and glossy yellow fungi, like an election cake atop, also some dead yellow and orange. July 29, 1853

Nature made ferns for pure leaves, to show what she could do in that line. July 29, 1853 

To Pine Hill, looking for the Vaccinium Pennsylvanicum berries. July 29, 1858 

I find plenty of bushes, but these bear very sparingly. July 29, 1858 

They appear to bear but one or two years before they are overgrown. July 29, 1858 

Also they probably love a cool atmosphere, for they bear annually on mountains, as Monadnock. July 29, 1858 

Where the woods have been cut a year or two they have put forth fresh shoots of a livelier green. July 29, 1858 

The V. vacillans berries are in dense clusters, raceme-like, as huckleberries are not. July 29, 1858 

Vaccinium vacillans begin to be pretty thick and some huckleberries. July 29, 1859

The Cyperus dentatus in bloom on hard sandy parts of meadows now is very interesting and handsome on being inspected now, with its bright chestnut purple sided flat spikelets, -- a plant and color looking toward autumn. Very neat and handsome on a close inspection. July 29, 1859

Also in dry sandy soil the little tufts of Fimbristylis capillaris in bloom are quite brown and withered-looking now, – another yet more autumnal-suggesting sight. July 29, 1859

The sight of the small rough sunflower about a dry ditch bank and hedge advances me at once further toward autumn. July 29, 1853

At the same time I hear a dry, ripe, autumnal chirp of a cricket. It is the next step to the first goldenrod. July 29, 1853

I see a geranium leaf turned red in the shade of a copse; the same color with the woodbine seen yesterday. July 29, 1852

The colors which some rather obscure leaves assume in the fall in dark copses or unobserved by the roadside interest me more than their flowers.  July 29, 1852

These leaves interest me as much as flowers. July 29, 1852

I should like to have a complete list of those that are the first to turn red or yellow. July 29, 1852

How attractive is color, especially red; kindred this with the color of fruits in the harvest and skies in the evening. July 29, 1852

Heat lightning flashes, which reveal a distant horizon to our twilight eyes. But my fellows simply assert that it is not broad day, which everybody knows, and fail to perceive the phenomenon at all. July 29, 1857

At 10 P.M. it is perfectly fair and bright starlight. July 29, 1851

I am interested in an indistinct prospect, a distant view, a mere suggestion often, revealing an almost wholly new world to me. I rejoice to get, and am apt to present, a new view. July 29, 1857

But I find it impossible to present my view to most people. In effect, it would seem that they do not wish to take a new view in any case. July 29, 1857

The most valuable communication or news consists of hints and suggestions. When a truth comes to be known and accepted, it begins to be bad taste to repeat it. Every individual constitution is a probe employed in a new direction, and a wise man will attend to each one's report. July 29, 1857

I am willing to pass for a fool in my often desperate, perhaps foolish, efforts to persuade them to lift the veil from off the possible and future, which they hold down with both their hands, before their eyes. July 29, 1857

*****

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau:

at Beck Stow's Swamp

 The Small Red Butterfly

the Marsh Hawk (Northern Harrier)

 Savory-leaved aster

The Blueberries

the Thistles

the Hawkweeds (hieracium)

Helianthus

The White Fringed Orchis

Rhexia Virginica (meadow-beauty)

 Haymaking

Lightning

 Starlight

*****

March 18, 1860 (“There is but one flower in bloom in the town, and this insect knows where to find it . . . No doubt this flower, too, has learned to expect its winged visitor knocking at its door in the spring.”)

May 21, 1860 (“The birches . . . leaves more like flowers than foliage.”)

July 5, 1854 ("One hundred and nine swallows on telegraph-wire at bridge within eight rods, and others flying about.")

July 11, 1856 (“See quite a flock of red-wing blackbirds and young (?)”)

July 12, 1853 ("Spikenard, not quite yet")

July 12, 1852 ("I observed this morning a row of several dozen swallows perched on the telegraph-wire by the bridge, and ever and anon a part of them would launch forth as with one consent, circle a few moments over the water or meadow, and return to the wire again."); 

July 12, 1859 (" They take their broods to the telegraph-wire for an aerial perch, where they teach them to fly.")

July 13, 1852 ("It is impossible to say what day — almost what week — the huckleberries begin to be ripe, unless you are acquainted with, and daily visit, every huckleberry bush in the town")

July 13, 1852 ("Huckleberries, both blue and black,must have been ripe several days.") 

July 13, 1856 (“See quite a large flock of chattering red-wings, the flight of first broods.”);

July 14, 1856 (“See and hear martins twittering on the elms by riverside.”)

July 15, 1854 (“There are many butterflies, yellow and red, about the Asclepias incarnata now.”)

July 16, 1857(“I hear of the first early blueberries brought to market.”)

July 17, 1857 ("Aralia racemosa, not in bloom")

July 17, 1853 ("I think we have no Hieracium Gronoviis")

July 18, 1852 ("The petals of the rhexia have a beautiful clear purple with a violet tinge.")

July 22, 1852 ("The Aster macrophyllus, large-leafed, in Miles's Swamp.") 

July 22, 1855 "See small flocks of red-wings, young and old, now, over the willows.”); 

July 24, 1853 ("The berries of the Vaccinium vacillans are very abundant and large this year on Fair Haven, where I am now.Indeed these and huckleberries and blackberries are very abundant in this part of the town.")

July 24, 1853 ("A spikenard just beyond the spring has already pretty large green berries, though a few flowers")
July 28, 1852 ("Goldenrod and asters have fairly begun; there are several kinds of each out")
July 28, 1856 ("Richweed at Brown's oak, several days (since 16th; say 22d).")
July 28, 1854 ("Partridges begin to go off in packs.")

Magically at dusk

the woods fill with fireflies and

the flute of the thrush.

July 29, 2013

July 30, 1852 ("Do not all flowers that blossom after mid-July remind us of the fall? ")
July 30, 1854 ("The tobacco-pipes are still pushing up white amid the dry leaves, sometimes lifting a canopy of leaves with them four or five inches")
July 30, 1853 ("If the meadows were untouched, I should no doubt see many more of the rare white and the beautiful smaller purple orchis there, as I now see a few along the shaded brooks and meadow's edge")
July 30, 1856 ("This is a perfect dog-day. The atmosphere thick, mildewy, cloudy. It is difficult to dry anything. The sun is obscured, yet we expect no rain.")
July 30, 1859 ("This dog-day weather I can see the bottom where five and a half feet deep.")
July 30, 1860 ("Am glad to press my way through Miles's Swamp . . . in cool openings, stands an island or two of great dark-green high blueberry bushes, with big cool blueberries,")

July 31, 1856 (“How thick the berries — low blackberries, Vaccinium vacillans, and huckleberries — on the side of Fair Haven Hill!”)

July 31, 1857 ("I also saw here, or soon after, the red cohosh berries, ripe, (for the first time in my life); spikenard, etc..")

August 1, 1856 ("They make a splendid show, these brilliant rose-colored [rhexia] patches . . Yet few ever see them in this perfection, unless the haymaker who levels them, or the birds that fly over the meadow.")

August 4, 1852 (“Most huckleberries and blueberries and low blackberries are in their prime now.”)

August 4, 1854 ("On this hill (Smith's) the bushes are black with huckleberries . . . Now in their prime. Some glossy black, some dull black, some blue; and patches of Vaccinium vacillans inter mixed.")

August 4. 1856 ("This favorable moist weather has expanded some of the huckleberries to the size of bullets") 

August 6, 1852 ("Aralia racemosa, how long?")

August 9, 1856 ("The flowers of A. macrophyllusare white with a very slight bluish tinge, in a coarse flat-topped corymb. Flowers nine to ten eighths of an inch in diameter."); 

August 22, 1858 ("How sturdily it pulls, shooting us along, catching more wind than I knew to be wandering in this river valley! It suggests a new power in the sail. . .The boat is like a plow drawn by a winged bull.")

August 26, 1856 ("Aster macrophyllus, now in its prime. It grows large and rank, two feet high. On one I count seventeen central flowers withered, one hundred and thirty in bloom, and half as many buds.") 

September 18, 1854 ("Fringed gentian . . .that has been cut off by the mowers . . . may after all be earlier.")

September 4, 1856 ("Aralia racemosa berries just ripe . . . not edible. ")

September 4, 1859 ("See a very large mass of spikenard berries fairly ripening, eighteen inches long.") September 9, 1856 [at Brattleboro] ("High up the mountain the Aster macrophyllus")

September 14, 1852 ("Amaranthus hypochondriacus, prince's-feather, with 'bright red-purple flowers' and sanguine stem")

October 23, 1853  ("Is it Gronovii or veiny-leaved?") 

July 29, 2018

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.

  April 7, 1853 

  July 28    < <<<<<  July 29  >>>>>   July 30

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  July 29

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/HDT29JULY