You will no sooner have got your pond dug than nature will begin to stock it.

October 10

In August, '55, I levelled for the artificial pond at Sleepy Hollow. They dug gradually for three or four years and completed the pond last year, '59.

It is now about a dozen rods long by five or six wide and two or three deep, and is supplied by copious springs in the meadow. There is a long ditch leading into it, in which no water now flows, nor has since winter at least, and a short ditch leading out of it into the brook. It is about sixty rods from the very source of the brook.

Well, in this pond thus dug in the midst of a meadow a year or two ago and supplied by springs in the meadow I find to-day several small patches of the large yellow and the kalmiana lily already established. Thus in the midst of death we are in life.

. . . The river, where these abound, is about half a mile distant down the little brook near which this pond lies, though there may be a few pads in the ditched part of it at half that distance.

How then, did the seed get here?

...

You have only to dig a pond anywhere in the fields hereabouts, and you will soon have not only water-fowl, reptiles, and fishes in it, but also the usual water-plants, as lilies, etc. You will no sooner have got your pond dug than nature will begin to stock it.

P. M. -- Went to a fire or smoke at Mrs. Hoar's.

There is a slight blaze and more smoke. Two or three hundred men rush to the house, cut large holes in the roof, throw many hogsheads of water into it, — when a few pails full well directed would suffice, and then they run off again, leaving your attic three inches deep with water, which is rapidly descending through the ceiling to the basement and spoiling all that can be spoiled, while a torrent is running down the stairways.

They were very forward to put out the [fire], but they take no pains to put out the water, which does far more damage. The first was amusement; the last would be mere work and utility.

Why is there not a little machine invented to throw the water out of a house?

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

A string of lakes which have not made up their minds to be rivers.

July 30

A. M. — On river to ascertain the rate of the current.

This dog-day weather I can see the bottom where five and a half feet deep. At five feet it is strewn clear across with sium, heart-leaf, Ranunculus Purshii, etc. It is quite green and verdurous, especially with the first. I see the fishes moving leisurely about amid the weeds, their affairs revealed, especially perch, — some large ones prowling there; and pickerel, large and small, lie imperturbable. 

I see more moss (?) covered rocks on the bottom and some rising quite near the surface, — three or four be tween my boat's place and thirty rods above, — and a good many three feet over on the bottom, revealed in the sunny water, and little suspected before. 

Indeed, the bottom may be considered rocky from above Dodd's to my boat's place, though you would suspect it only when looking through this clear water. They are so completely covered with moss-like weeds or tresses that you do not see them, — like the heads of mermaids. 

A rock there is a nucleus or hard core to a waving mass of weeds, and you must probe it hard with a paddle to detect the hard core. No doubt many a reach is thus rock-strewn which is supposed to have an uninterruptedly muddy bottom. They sleep there concealed under these long tresses on the bottom, suggesting a new kind of antiquity. 

There is nothing to wear on and polish them there. They do not bear the paint rubbed off from any boat. Though unsuspected by the oldest fisher, they have eyed Concord for centuries through their watery veil without ever parting their tresses to look at her. 

Perchance the increased stagnancy of the river at this season makes the water more transparent, it being easier to look into stagnant water than when the particles are in rapid motion. 

The outside heart-leaves above Dodd's grow in six feet of water, and also the kalmiana lily. 

Trying the current there, there being a very faint, chiefly side, wind, commonly not enough to be felt on the cheek or to ripple the water, — what would be called by most a calm, — my bottle floats about seventy-five feet in forty minutes, and then, a very faint breeze beginning to drive it back, I cannot wait to see when it will go a hundred. It is, in short, an exceedingly feeble current, almost a complete standstill. 

My boat is altogether blown up-stream, even by this imperceptible breath. Indeed, you can in such a case feel the pulse of our river only in the shallowest places, where it preserves some slight passage between the weeds. It faints and gives up the ghost in deeper places on the least adverse wind, and you would presume it dead a thousand times, if you did not apply the nicest tests, such as a feather to the nostrils of a drowned man. 

It is a mere string of lakes which have not made up their minds to be rivers. As near as possible to a standstill. 

Yet by sinking a strawberry box beneath the surface I found that there was a slight positive current there, that when a chip went pretty fast up-stream in this air, the same with the box sunk one foot and tied to it went slowly down, at three feet deep or more went faster than when the box was sunk only one foot. The water flowed faster down at three feet depth than at one, there where it was about seven feet deep, and though the surface for several inches deep may be flowing up in the wind, the weeds at bottom will all be slanted down. 

Indeed, I suspect that at four or five feet depth the weeds will be slanted downward in the strongest wind that blows up, in that the current is always creeping along downward underneath. 

After my first experiments I was surprised to find that the weeds at bottom slanted down-stream. I have also been surprised to find that in the clear channel between the potamogetons, though it looked almost stagnant, it was hard to swim against it; as at Rice's Bend. 

See many cowbirds about cows.

P. M. — Left boat at Rice's Bend. 

I spoke to him of the clapper rail. He remembered that his father once killed a bird, a sort of mud-hen, which they called the tinker, since he made [a] noise just like a tinker on brass, and they used to set it agoing in the meadows by striking two coppers together. His father stuffed it and did not know what it was. It had a long body. 

Yet the river in the middle of Concord is swifter than above or below, and if Concord people are slow in consequence of their river's influence, the people of Sudbury and Carlisle should be slower still.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, July 30, 1859

I can see the bottom where five and a half feet deep. I see the fishes moving leisurely about amid the weeds, their affairs revealed, especially perch, — some large ones prowling there; and pickerel, large and small, lie imperturbable. See  July 18, 1854 ("I do not know why the water should be so remarkably clear and the sun shine through to the bottom of the river, making it so plain.“);  July 27, 1860 ("The water has begun to be clear and sunny, revealing the fishes and countless minnows of all sizes and colors”); July 28, 1859 ("The season has now arrived when I begin to see further into the water, — see the bottom, the weeds, and fishes more than before. I can see the bottom when it is five and a half feet deep even, see the fishes, especially the perch, scuttling in and out amid the weeds.."); July 30, 1856 ("The wonderful clearness of the water, enabling you to explore the river bottom and many of its secrets now...”)

My bottle floats about seventy-five feet in forty minutes, and then, a very faint breeze beginning to drive it back, I cannot wait to see when it will go a hundred. Compare June 24, 1859 ("Simonds of Bedford, who is measuring the rapidity of the current at Carlisle Bridge, says that a board with a string attached ran off there one hundred yards in fifteen minutes");   July 25, 1859 ("a bottle sunk low in the water floats one hundred feet . . . in four and a half minutes.")

It is a mere string of lakes which have not made up their minds to be rivers. As near as possible to a standstill. See April 16, 1852 ("A succession of bays it is, a chain of lakes, . . .There is just stream enough for a flow of thought; that is all. Many a foreigner who has come to this town has worked for years on its banks without discovering which way the river runs. ")

July 30. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, July 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 © 2009-2025

A great devil's-needle alights on my paddle.

July 27. 

Lobelia cardinalis, three or four days, with similar white glands (?) on edges of leaves as in L. spicata. Why is not this noticed? 

Cornus sericea about done.

As I paddle by Dodge's Brook, a great devil's-needle alights on my paddle, between my hands. It is about three inches long and three and a half in spread of wings, without spots, black and yellow, with green eyes (?). It keeps its place within a few inches of my eyes, while I was paddle some twenty-five rods against a strong wind, clinging closely. Perhaps it chose that place for coolness this hot day. 

To-day, as yesterday, it is more comfortable to be walking or paddling at 2 and 3 p. m., when there is wind, but at five the wind goes down and it is very still and suffocating. I afterward saw other great devil's-needles, the forward part of their bodies light-blue and very stout. 

The Stellaria longifolia is out of bloom and drying up. Vide some of this date pressed. 

At Bath Place, above, many yellow lily pads are left high and dry for a long time, in the zizania hollow, a foot or more above the dry sand, yet with very firm and healthy green leaves, almost the only ones not eaten by insects now. This river is quite low. 

The yellow lilies stand up seven or eight inches above the water, and, opposite to Merriam's, the rocks show their brown backs very thick (though some are concealed), like sheep and oxen lying down and chewing the cud in a meadow. I frequently run on to one — glad when it's the smooth side — and am tilted up this way or that, or spin round as on a central pivot. They bear the red or blue paint from many a boat, and here their moss has been rubbed off. 

Ceratophyllum is now apparently in bloom commonly, with its crimson-dotted involucre. 

I am surprised to find kalmiana lilies scattered thinly all along the Assabet, a few small, commonly reddish pads in middle of river, but I see no flowers. It is their great bluish waved (some green) radical leaves which I had mistaken for those of the heart-leaf, the floating leaves being so small. These and vallisneria washed up some time. The radical leaves of the heart-leaf are very small and rather triangular. 

I see, on a rock in midstream, a peetweet within a foot of a turtle, both eying me anxiously within two rods, but not minding each other. 

Zizania scarce out some days at least.

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

A great devil's-needle alights on my paddle... See  June 13, 1854 ("I float homeward over water almost perfectly smooth, my sail so idle that I count ten devil's-needles resting along it at once."); July 17, 1854 ("I am surprised to see crossing my course in middle of Fair Haven Pond great yellowish devil's-needles, flying from shore to shore.").

June 13. 

Floating homeward, I 

count devil's-needles at rest 

on my idle sail.

July 17.

Flying shore to shore, 

yellowish devil's-needles 

cross their Atlantic. 

July 27

A devil's-needle 

keeps its place on my paddle

against a strong wind.

July 27, 1856

A painted tortoise laying her eggs ten feet from the wheel-track on the Marlborough road.

June 10. 

June 10, 2016

8 A. M. — Getting lily pads opposite Badger’s.

Already the pads are much eaten before they are grown, and underneath, on the under side of almost every one, are the eggs of various species of insect, some so minute as to escape detection at first, in close, flat, straight-sided nests. 

The yellow lily and kalmiana are abundantly out. The under sides of the pads, their stems, and the Ranunculus Purshii and other water-plants are thickly covered and defiled with the sloughs, perhaps of those little fuzzy gnats (in their first state) which have so swarmed over the river. It is quite difficult to clean your specimens of them. 

P. M. — To Dugan Desert.

Cornus alternifolia a day or two, up railroad; maybe longer elsewhere. 

Spergularia rubra by railroad, it having been dug up last year, and so delayed. 

The cuckoo of June 5th has deserted her nest, and I find the fragments of egg-shells in it; probably because I found it. 

Oxalis freshly out: how long? Apparently but two or three days. 

I find some linnaea well out, after all, within a rod of the top of the hill, apparently two or three days. If it flowered more abundantly, probably it would be earlier. 

Chewink’s nest with four young in the dry sprout-land of Loring’s thick wood that was, under a completely overarching tuft of dry sedge grass. 

I hear the huckleberry-bird now add to its usual strain a-tea tea tea tea tea. 

A painted tortoise laying her eggs ten feet from the wheel-track on the Marlborough road. She paused at first, but I sat down within two feet, and she soon resumed her work. Had excavated a hollow about five inches wide and six long in the moistened sand, and cautiously, with long intervals, she continued her work, resting always on the same spot her fore feet, and never looking round, her eye shut all but a narrow slit. 

Whenever I moved, perhaps to brush off a mosquito, she paused. A wagon approached, rumbling afar off, and then there was a pause, till it had passed and long, long after, a tedious, naturlangsam pause of the slow-blooded creature, a sacrifice of time such as those animals are up to which slumber half a year and live for centuries. 

It was twenty minutes before I discovered that she was not making the hole but filling it up slowly, having laid her eggs. She drew the moistened sand under herself, scraping it along from behind with both feet brought together, the claws turned inward. In the long pauses the ants troubled her (as mosquitoes me) by running over her eyes, which made her snap or dart out her head suddenly, striking the shell. She did not dance on the sand, nor finish covering the hollow quite so carefully as the one observed last year. 

She went off suddenly (and quickly at first), with a slow but sure instinct through the wood toward the swamp.

The clustered blackberry of Dugan Desert not yet out, nor apparently for two or three days. 

Sweet Viburnum apparently two or three days at most, by Warren Miles’s, Nut Meadow Pond. 

In a hollow apple tree, hole eighteen inches deep, young pigeon woodpeckers, large and well feathered. They utter their squeaking hiss whenever I cover the hole with my hand, apparently taking it for the approach of the mother. A strong, rank fetid smell issues from the hole. 

Ripe strawberries, even in a meadow on sand thrown out of a ditch, hard at first to detect amid the red radical leaves. The flower-buds of late there have now that rank smell. 

Lambkill out, at Clamshell. 

The Cratoegus Crus-Galli is out of bloom. 

Arenaria serpyllifolia is out of bloom at Clamshell.

Side-flowering sandwort abundantly out this side of Dugan Spring. 

Solanum well out, by Wood’s Bridge.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, June 10, 1856

I find some linnaea well out. See June 1, 1855 ("I find the Linnaea borealis."); June 4, 1855 ("The Linnæa borealis has grown an inch"); June 6, 1853 ("The linnæa just out.");and  note to June 9, 1851 ("Gathered the Linnæa borealis.")

The one [laying painted tortoise] observed last year.  See June 18, 1855 ("after a slight pause it proceeds in its work, directly under and within eighteen inches of my face.”). See also June 10, 1858 (“See a painted turtle digging her nest in the road at 5.45 P. M.”) and A Book of the Seasons,    by Henry Thoreau, The Painted Turtle (Emys Picta)

Sweet Viburnum apparently two or three days at most . . . See June 10, 1854 ("The Viburnum lentago is just out of bloom now that the V. nudum is fairly begun.”); June 10, 1857 (“At R.W.E.'s a viburnum, apparently nudum var. cassinoides (?)”)

Warren Miles's, Nut Meadow Pond . . . See May 7, 1856 ("The brook below is full of fishes,--suckers, pouts, eels, trouts,-- endeavoring to get up, but his dam prevents."); April 28, 1856 ("I began to survey the meadow there early, . . .but a great stream of water was already rushing down the brook, and it almost rose over our boots in the meadow before we had done.”); April 25, 1856 ("Warren Miles had caught three more snapping turtles since yesterday, at his mill, . . . These turtles have been disturbed or revealed by his operations.”); April 24 1856 (Warren Miles at his new mill tells me eels can’t get above his mill now, in the spring.”); February 28, 1856 ("Miles is repairing the damage done at his new mill by the dam giving way.”)

Lambkill out, at Clamshell. See June 9, 1855 ("Lambkill out."); June 10, 1855 ("The Kalmia glauca is done before the lambkill is begun here"); June 13, 1854 ("How beautiful the solid cylinders of the lamb-kill now just before sunset . . .”).

Ripe strawberries . . .amid the red radical leaves.  See June 14, 1859 ("Early strawberries begin to be common. The lower leaves of the plant are red, concealing the fruit."); June 15, 1853 ("Strawberries in the meadow now ready for the picker. They lie deep at the roots of the grass in the shade. You spread aside the tall grass, and deep down in little cavities by the roots of the grass you find this rich fruit.”)

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

Strawberries after rain

June 14. 

Up river. 

See young red-wings; like grizzly-black vultures, they are still so bald. See many empty red-wing nests now amid the Camus sericea. 

The bluebird’s nest high in the black willow at Sassafras Shore has five eggs. The gold robin’s nest, which I could pull down within reach, just beyond, has three eggs. I have one. 

I tell C. to look into an old mortise-hole in Wood’s Bridge for a white-bellied swallow’s nest, as we paddle under; but he laughs, incredulous. I insist, and when he climbs up he scares out the bird. Five eggs. “You see the feathers about, do you not?” “Yes,” said he. 

Kalmiana lily, several days. The little galium in meadow, say one day. 

A song sparrow’s nest in ditch bank under Clamshell, of coarse grass lined with fine, and five eggs nearly hatched and a peculiar dark end to them. Have one or more and the nest. The bird evidently deserted the nest when two eggs had been taken. Could not see her return to it, nor find her on it again after we had flushed her. 

A kingbird’s nest with four eggs on a large horizontal stem or trunk of a black willow, four feet high, over the edge of the river, amid small shoots from the willow; outside of mikania, roots, and knotty sedge, well lined with root fibres and wiry weeds. 

Viburnum dentatum, apparently not long, say two days, and carrion-flower the same. 

Looked at the peetweet’s nest which C. found yesterday. It was very difficult to find again in the broad open meadow; no nest but a mere hollow in the dead cranberry leaves, the grass and stubble ruins, under a little alder. The old bird went off at last from under us; low in the grass at first and with wings up, making a worried sound which attracted other birds. I frequently noticed others afterward flying low over the meadow and alighting and uttering this same note of alarm. 

There were only four eggs in this nest yesterday, and to-day, to C.’s surprise, there are the two eggs which he left and a young peetweet beside; a gray pinch of down with a black centre to its back, but already so old and precocious that it runs with its long legs swiftly off from squatting beside the two eggs, and hides in the grass. We have some trouble to catch it. 

How came it here with these eggs, which will not be hatched for some days? C. saw nothing of it yesterday. These eggs were not addled (I had opened one, C. another). Did this bird come from another nest, or did it belong to an earlier brood? Eggs white, with black spots here and there all over, dim at great end. (J. Farmer says that young peetweets run at once like partridges and quails, and that they are the only birds he knows that do.)

A cherry-bird’s nest and two eggs in an apple tree fourteen feet from ground. One egg, round black spots and a few oblong, about equally but thinly dispersed over the whole, and a dim, internal, purplish tinge about the large end. It is difficult to see anything of the bird, for she steals away early, and you may neither see nor hear anything of her while examining the nest, and so think it deserted. Approach very warily and look out for them a dozen or more rods off. 

It suddenly begins to rain with great violence, and we in haste draw up our boat on the Clamshell shore, upset it, and get under, sitting on the paddles, and so are quite dry while our friends thought we were being wet to our skins. But we have as good a roof as they. It is very pleasant to lie there half an hour close to the edge of the water and see and hear the great drops patter on the river, each making a great bubble; the rain seemed much heavier for it. 

The swallows at once and numerously begin to fly low over the water in the rain, as they had not before, and the toads’ spray rings in it. After it begins to hold up, the wind veers a little to the east and apparently blows back the rear of the cloud, and blows a second rain somewhat in upon us. 

As soon as the rain is over I crawl out, straighten my legs, and stumble at once upon a little patch of strawberries within a rod, -- the sward red with them. These we pluck while the last drops are thinly falling. 

Silene antirrhina out on Clamshell, how long? 

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, June 14, 1855

It suddenly begins to rain with great violence, and we in haste draw up our boat on the Clamshell shore, upset it, and get under. See July 22, 1858 (“C. and I took refuge from a shower under our boat at Clamshell; staid an hour at least.”)

A little patch of strawberries. See June 14, 1859 ("Early strawberries begin to be common. The lower leaves of the plant are red, concealing the fruit. "); June 10, 1856 ("Ripe strawberries . . . hard at first to detect amid the red radical leaves.”); June 15, 1853 ("Strawberries in the meadow now ready for the picker. They lie deep at the roots of the grass in the shade. You spread aside the tall grass, and deep down in little cavities by the roots of the grass you find this rich fruit.”)



Silene antirrhina: sleepy campion.

A sparrow's nest, five eggs.

 June 5.  P. M. — To Clamshell by river.  

Yellow Bethlehem-star in prime. 

Aphyllon, or orobanche, well out apparently several days. 

Nuphar Kalmiana budded above water. Green-briar flower out apparently two or three days. Low blackberry out in low ground. 

That very early (or in winter green radical leaf) plant by ash is the myosotis laxa, open since the 28th of May, say June 1st. 

Ranunculus repens, say two days out, river being very low. Common cress well out along river.

302 Side-flowering Sandwort 303 Flower magnified 

(Gray 1859)

Side-flowering sandwort apparently three days out in Clamshell flat meadow. 

Some oxalis done, say two or three days, on ditch bank. 

Ranunculus repens in prime. 

Yellow clover well out some days. 

Flowering ferns, reddish-green, show on meadows. 

Green oak-balls. 

Walking along the upper edge of the flat Clamshell meadow, a bird, probably a song sparrow (for I saw two chipping about immediately after), flew up from between my feet, and I soon found its nest remarkably concealed. 

It was under the thickest of the dry river wreck, with an entry low on one side, full five inches long and very obscure. On looking close I detected the eggs from above by looking down through some openings in the wreck about as big as sparrows’ eggs, through which I saw the eggs, five in number. I never saw the nest so perfectly concealed. 

I am much interested to see how Nature proceeds to heal the wounds where the turf was stripped off this meadow. There are large patches where nothing remained but pure black mud, nearly level or with slight hollows like a plate in it. This the sun and air had cracked into irregular polygonal figures, a foot, more or less, in diameter. The whole surface of these patches here is now covered with a short, soft, and pretty dense moss-like vegetation springing up and clothing it. 

The little hollows and the cracks are filled with a very dense growth of reddish grass or sedge, about one inch high, the growth in the cracks making pretty regular figures as in a carpet, while the intermediate spaces are very evenly but much more thinly covered with minute sarothra and whitish Gnaphalium uliginosum. Thus the wound is at once scarred over. Apparently the seeds of that grass were heavier and were washed into the hollows and cracks. Is it likely that the owner has sprinkled seed here?

H. D. Thoreau,  Journal, June 5, 1855

Yellow Bethlehem-star in prime.  See June 15, 1851 ("The Hypoxis erecta, yellow Bethlehem-star, where there is a thick, wiry grass in open path; should be called yellow-eyed grass, methinks.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Yellow Bethlehem-star

Aphyllon, or orobanche, well out apparently several days. See June 13, 1852 ("Orobanche uniflora, single-flowered broom-rape (Bigelow), [or] Aphyllon uniflorum, one-flowered cancer-root (Gray). C. found it June 12 at Clematis Brook."); June 21, 1852 ("Found the single-flowered broom-rape in Love Lane, under the oak.")

That very early (or in winter green radical leaf) plant by ash is the Myosotis laxa. See June 12, 1852 ("The mouse-ear forget me-not (Myosotis laxa) is one of the most interesting minute flowers. It is the more beautiful for being small and unpretending, for even flowers must be modest.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Mouse-ear forget-me-not

Side-flowering sandwort apparently three days out in Clamshell flat meadow. See May 26, 1853 ("Side-flowering sandwort is abundant, for some time, by wall of Lee's field near Garfield's."); June 3, 1859 ("Arenaria lateriflora well out, how long? "); June 6, 1852 ("The side-flowering sandwort, an inconspicuous white flower like a chickweed."); June 10, 1856 ("Side-flowering sandwort abundantly out this side of Dugan Spring."); June 13, 1858 ("Arenaria lateriflora, how long?")

Ranunculus repens in prime. See May 19, 1858 ("R. repens . . . the earliest ranunculus. It is a dense bed of yellow now. I am struck by the light spot in the sinuses of the leaves. "); See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Ranunculus Repens

Some oxalis done. See June 3, 1860 ("These are the clear breezy days of early June, when the leaves are young and few and the sorrel not yet in its prime.");  June 6, 1857 ("Now I am ice, now I am sorrel. Each experience reduces itself to a mood of the mind.");See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Wood Sorrel (Oxalis)

Yellow clover well out some days. See May 24, 1852 (" Found in College Yard Trifolium procumbens, or yellow clover."); May 30, 1856 ("Yellow clover abundantly out, though the heads are small yet. Are they quite open?")

A sparrow's nest remarkably concealed . . .  the eggs, five in number. See June 9, 1855 ("A song sparrow’s nest low in Wheeler’s meadow, with five eggs, made of grass lined with hair.");  June 14, 1855 ("A song sparrow’s nest in ditch bank under Clamshell, of coarse grass lined with fine, and five eggs nearly hatched and a peculiar dark end to them."); see also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Song Sparrow (Fringilla melodia)

Whitish Gnaphalium uliginosum [(Marsh Cudweed] See June 24, 1853 ("The Gnaphalium uliginosum seems to be almost in blossom."); July 11, 1853 ("Gnaphalium uliginosum now."):  July 17, 1852 ("Gnaphalium uliginosum by the roadside,"); July 24, 1856 ("Some Gnaphalium uliginosum going to seed; how long?")

I am much interested to see how Nature proceeds to heal the wounds where the turf was stripped off this meadow. See March 28, 1855 ("Over a great many acres, the meadows have been cut up into great squares and other figures by the ice of February, as if ready to be removed"); February 28, 1855 ("This is a powerful agent at work.")

June 5. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, June 5

A bird flies up from 

between my feet and I soon 

find its concealed nest. 

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, A sparrow's nest, five eggs.

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

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-550605

While we sit by the path in the depths of the woods

May 28

P.M. —To Middle Conantum Cliff. 

Yesterday left my boat at the willow opposite this Cliff, the wind northwest. Now it is southeast, and I can sail back. 

May 28, 2025

Our quince open this morning, possibly yesterday; and some others, I believe, much earlier. 

Do I not hear a short snappish, rasping note from a yellow-throat vireo? 

I see a tanager, the most brilliant and tropical-looking bird we have, bright-scarlet with black wings, the scarlet appearing on the rump again between wing-tips. He brings heat, or heat him. A remarkable contrast with the green pines. At this distance he has the aspect and manners of a parrot, with a fullness about the head and throat and beak, indolently inspecting the limbs and twigs —leaning over to it — and sitting still a long time. The female, too, is a neat and handsome bird, with the same indolent ways, but very differently colored from the male; all yellow below with merely dusky wings, and a sort of clay(?)-color on back. 

While we sit by the path in the depths of the woods three quarters of a mile beyond Hayden’s, confessing the influence of almost the first summer warmth, the wood thrush sings steadily for half an hour, now at 2.30 P.M., amid the pines, — loud and clear and sweet. While other birds are warbling betweenwhiles and catching their prey, he alone appears to make a business of singing, like a true minstrel. 

Is that one which I see at last in the path above dusky olive-brown becoming ferruginous on base of tail, eye not very prominent with a white line around it, some dark-colored feathers apparently on outer wing-coverts, very light colored legs, with dashes on breast which I do not see clearly? I should say that it had not the large black eye of the hermit thrush, and I cannot see the yellowish spot on the wings; yet it may have been this. 

I find the feathers apparently of a brown thrasher in the path, plucked since we passed here last night. You can generally find all the tail and quill feathers in such a case. 

The apple bloom is very rich now. 

Fever-bush shoots are now two inches long; say begin to leaf just before late willow. Black ash shoots three inches long; say with late willow. White pine and pitch pine shoots from two to five inches long. 

Rubus triflorus at Miles Swamp will apparently open to-morrow.

Some krigia done some days. Silene Antirrhina. Barberry open (probably two or more days at Lee’s). 

C. says he has seen a green snake. 

Examined my two yellowbirds’ nests of the 25th. Both are destroyed, —pulled down and torn to pieces probably by some bird, — though they  but just begun to lay. 

Large yellow and black butterfly. 

The leaves of kalmiana lily obvious. 

I have seen within three or four days two or three new warblers which I have not identified; one to-day, in the woods, all pure white beneath, with a full breast, and greenish-olive-yellow (?) above, with a duskier head and a slight crest muscicapa-like, on pines, etc., high; very small.(Perhaps young and female redstarts.) Also one all lemon-yellow beneath, except whitish vent, and apparently bluish above.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 28, 1855

Yesterday left my boat at the willow opposite this Cliff, the wind northwest. Now it is southeast, and I can sail back. See August 12, 1854 ("To Conantum by boat. To-day there is an uncommonly strong wind, against which I row, yet in shirt-sleeves, trusting to sail back. It is southwest.); August 24, 1854 ("A strong wind from the south-southwest, which I expect will waft me back.")

Do I not hear a short snappish, rasping note from a yellow-throat vireo?  See   May 11, 1855 ("Hear and see yellow-throat vireo. ");  May 27, 1854 ("I see and hear the yellow-throated vireo. It is somewhat similar (its strain) to that of the red-eye, prelia pre-li-ay, with longer intervals. . .It flits about in the tops of the trees");. May 29, 1855 ("Also the yellow-throated vireo — its head and shoulders as well as throat yellow (apparently olive-yellow above), and its strain but little varied and short, not continuous. It has dusky legs and two very distinct white bars on wings (the male)"); See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Yellow-throated Vireo

I see a tanager . . . A remarkable contrast with the green pines. See May 23, 1853 ("How he enhances the wildness and wealth of the woods! That contrast of a red bird with the green pines and the blue sky!”); . May 29, 1853 (" tt appears as if he loved to contrast himself with the green of the forest"); May 24, 1860 ("You can hardly believe that a living creature can wear such colors”) See also A Book of the Seasons, ,by Henry Thoreau, the Scarlet Tanager

The wood thrush . . . alone appears to make a business of singing, like a true minstrel.  May 17, 1853 ("The wood thrush has sung for some time. He touches a depth in me which no other bird's song does. "); June 22, 1853  (“This is the only bird whose note affects me like music, affects the flow and tenor of my thought, my fancy and imagination.”)  See also  A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  The Wood Thrush

Is that one which I see . . . eye not very prominent with a white line around it, . . . with dashes on breast which I do not see clearly? See May 22, 1852 ("The female (and male?) wood thrush spotted the whole length of belly; the hermit thrush not so”) and note to April 24, 1856 ("[S]ee a brown bird flit, and behold my hermit thrush, with one companion, flitting silently through the birches. I saw the fox-color on his tail-coverts, as well as the brown streaks on the breast. ”).

 The apple bloom is very rich now. See May 27, 1857 ("This is blossom week, beginning last Sunday (the 24th).") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Apple Blossom Time

Rubus triflorus at Miles Swamp will apparently open to-morrow. See May 21, 1856 ("Rubus triflorus abundantly out at the Saw Mill Brook");  May 29, 1858 ("Rubus triflorus, well out, at Calla Swamp, how long?"); See also A Book of the Seasons,  A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Raspberry

C. says he has seen a green snake. See  May 9, 1852 ("See a green snake, twenty or more inches long, on a bush, hanging over a twig with its head held forward six inches into the air, without support and motionless.”); May 19, 1860 (“See a green snake, a very vivid yellow green, of the same color with the tender foliage at present, and as if his colors had been heightened by the rain.”)

Large yellow and black butterfly. See June 3, 1859 ("A large yellow butterfly (somewhat Harris Papilio Asterias like but not black-winged) three and a half to four inches in expanse. Pale-yellow, the front wings crossed by three or four black bars; rear, or outer edge, of all wings widely bordered with black, and some yellow behind it; a short black tail to each hind one, with two blue spots in front of two red-brown ones on the tail. (P. Turnus ?)");   June 14, 1860 ("I see near at hand two of those large yellow (and black) butterflies which I have probably seen nearly a month . They rest on the mud near a brook. Two and three quarters to three inches in alar extent; yellow with a broad black border, outside of which a row of small yellow spots; three or four black marks transversely to the fore wings, and two fine lines parallel with the body on the hinder (?) wings; a small and slender swallow tail with reddish brown and blue at the tail; body black above and yellow along the sides. (C. says it is the Papilio Turnus of Say.)"

Two or three new warblers which I have not identified. See  April 19, 1854 ("Within a few days the warblers have begun to come. They are of every hue. Nature made them to show her colors with. There are as many as there are colors and shades. "); May 6, 1859 ("Hear yellow-throat vireo, and probably some new warblers"); .May 15, 1860 ("Deciduous woods now swarm with migrating warblers, especially about swamps”); May 23, 1857 ("This is the time and place to hear the new-arriving warblers, the first fine days after the May storm. When the leaves generally are just fairly expanding. . . these birds are flitting about in the tree-tops like gnats, catching the insects about the expanding leaf-buds")

May 28. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, May 28

We sit by the path 

in the depths of the woods while

now the wood thrush sings. 

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, While we sit by the path in the depths of the woods

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

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-550528