Botanizing the Assabet near House-leek Rock

August 5. 

August 5, 2016

A. M. — On river. 

Mikania a day or two. Polygonum amphibium in water, slightly hairy, well out. Polygonum orientate, how long? 

P. M. — To house-leek via Assabet Bath. 

Trichostema, maybe several days in some places. Nightshade berries, how long ? 

When I crossed the new stone bridge a great water adder lay on it, full five feet long and nearly as big round as my arm. It turned and ran along, with a coarse grating rustle, to the end of the railing, and then dropped deliberately head foremost from the last abutment, full nine feet, to the gravelly ground, amid the osiers, making a loud sound when he struck; at once took to the water, and showed his head amid the pads. I also saw another similar one at House-leek Rock. 

Centaurea well out, how long? 

Aster dumosus, apparently a day or two, with its large conspicuous flower-buds at the end of the branchlets and linear-spatulate involucral scales. 

At haunted house site, as at Bittern Cliff grain-field, I see much apparent Euphorbia maculata semi-erect in the grass. Eupatorium pubescens, by Pear Path. 

I now find an abundance of the clustered rubus ripe. It is not large and has a clammy, subacid taste, but some are very sweet. Clusters generally drooping.

Hypericum mutilum, dwart St. John’s-wort,
August 2, 2019

Now, at 4 p. m. this dog-day, cloudy weather, the Hypericum mutilum is abundantly open in the Solidago lanceolata path, sometimes fifteen inches high, while the Canadense and angulatum are shut.

S. lanceolata, some days. S. nemoralis, two or three days. 

Choke-cherries near House-leek Rock begin to be ripe, though still red. They are scarcely edible, but their beauty atones for it. See those handsome racemes of ten or twelve cherries each, dark glossy red, semi- transparent. You love them not the less because they are not quite palatable. Along fences or hedgerows. 

Sempervivium
(houseleek ~ hen & chickens)

To my surprise one house-leek (apparently Sempervivum tectorum of Dewey) has shot up twenty-two inches high and is apparently nearly out, though the petals are erect, not spread. The stem is clothed with the same thick leaves, only smaller and lessening up ward and forming a column about one and a half inches in diameter (with the leaves). The top is a broad raceme (?), about eight inches wide and two thirds as long, of eleven long, spreading, and recurved branches, lined with flowers on the upper side only. These consist of twelve to thirteen lanceolate calyx-segments and as many still longer dull-purple petals and about twenty pistils within and short stamens around them. It is a strange but rather stately cactus-like plant. 

The children call the pretty clusters of radical leaves hen and chickens. In this case the radical leaves are withered, and a fusiform root sustains the flower. This one is not on the bare rock, but lower amid the huckleberry bushes. 

At the Assabet stone bridge, apparently freshly in flower, — though it may have been out nearly as long as the androscemifolium, — apparently the Apocynum cannabinum var. hypericifolium (?). The tallest is four feet high. The flowers very small (hardly more than an eighth of an inch in diameter), the segments of the corolla not revolute but nearly erect. There are twenty to thirty flowers at end of a branch. The divisions of the calyx are longer than in the common, long ovate. Yet it differs from Gray's hypericifolium in having flowers rose-streaked within like the common, the cymes not shorter than the leaves, and the tube of the corolla rather longer than the divisions of the calyx. The leaves are hardly more downy or heart-shaped below than the common. Hypericifolium is a separate species in Pursh and some others. And the branches are less ascending than the common, making an angle of about 62° with the stem (the four lower), while three of the lower of a common one make an angle of 44°.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, August 5, 1856

Now, at 4 p. m . . .The Hypericum mutilum is abundantly open . .. sometimes fifteen inches high, while the Canadense and angulatum are shut.  See August 12, 1856 ("11 a. m. . . .  The Hypericum mutilum is well out at this hour.");   August 17, 1856 ("Hypericum Canadense well out at 2 p. m"); .August 19, 1856 ("I see Hypericum Canadense and mutilum abundantly open at 3 p. m");  August 27, 1856  ("Hypericum Canadense and mutilum now pretty generally open at 4 P.M., thus late in the season, it being more moist and cooler."). See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, St. Johns-wort (Hypericum)

A great water adder . . .full five feet long and nearly as big round as my arm . . . See July 23, 1856("water adder killed on the 15th and left hanging on a twig"); July 15, 1856 ("It was about three feet long, but large round in proportion, with about one hundred and forty abdominal plates and a long, slender tail. . . .").

Choke-cherries. . .scarcely edible, but their beauty atones for it. See September 3, 1853 ("Now is the season for those comparatively rare but beautiful wild berries which are not food for man. . . ., it is strange that we do not devote an hour in the year to gathering those which are beautiful to the eye. It behooves me to go a-berrying in this sense once a year at least. . . .”)

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

 

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

The clump of golden willows west of new stone bridge is very handsome now seen from hill.

May 18.

P. M. — Boat to Nut Meadow. 

MAY 18, 2015

Large devil’s-needle. 

Sassafras well open. How long? Celtis will probably shed pollen to-morrow; shoots already an inch long. Sorrel pollen. 

First veery strain. 

Green-briar leafed several days. Veronica serpylli folia well out (how long?) at Ash Bank Spring. 


See the yellow-legs feeding on shore. Legs not bright-yellow. Goes off with the usual whistle; also utters a long monotonous call as it is standing on the shore, not so whistling. Am inclined to think it the lesser yellow-legs (though I think the only one we see). Yet its bill appears quite two inches long. Is it curved up? 

Observe a blackbird’s (red-wing’s) nest finished. At Clamshell a bay-wing sparrow’s nest, four eggs (young half hatched) -- some black-spotted, others not.

These last warmer days a great many fishes dart away from close to the shore, where they seem to lie now more than ever. I see some darting about and rippling the water there with large back fins out, either pouts or suckers (not pickerel certainly). Apparently their breeding-season arrived. Is not this where the fish hawks get them? 

Rhodora; probably some yesterday. Black scrub oak pollen. Fir balsam pollen; say begins to leaf at same time. 

The clump of golden willows west of new stone bridge is very handsome now seen from hill, with its light-yellowish foliage, because the stems of the trees are seen through it.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 18, 1855

Large devil’s-needle. See April 27, 1856 ("I see a rather large devil’s-needle coursing over the low osiers in Pinxter Swamp. Is it not early for one?"); May 23, 1856("A warm summer-like night. A bullfrog trumps once. A large devil’s—needle goes by after sundown."); May 30, 1860 ("Saw some devil’s-needles (the first) about the 25th."); June 6, 1852 ("First devil's-needles in the air, and some smaller, bright-green ones on flowers."); June 8, 1855  ("A great many devil’s-needles in woods within a day or two."); June 6, 1857 ("I see many great devil's-needles in an open wood") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Devil's-needle

First veery strain. See  May 17, 1852 ("The first veery note."); May 17, 1853 ("the veery constantly now.");  May 17, 1856  ("Hear the first veery note."); May 23, 1857 ("Hear the first veery strain.") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Veery

Tell tale, great yellow-legs. See May 31, 1854 ( "It acts the part of a telltale."   "watchful, but not timid, ... while it stands on the lookout ... wades in the water to the middle of its yellow legs; goes off with a loud and sharp phe phe phe phe. ...")

The clump of golden willows west of new stone bridge is very handsome now seen from hill, with its light-yellowish foliage. See   January 21, 1855 ("Few twigs are conspicuous at a distance like those of the golden willow. The tree is easily distinguished at a distance by its color."); May 14, 1852 ("These willows have yellow bark, bear yellow flowers and yellowish-green leaves, and are now haunted by the summer yellowbird and Maryland yellow-throat") ; May 15, 1853 ("The golden willow catkins begin to fall; their prime is past."); May 16, 1854 ("Yesterday, when the blossoms of the golden willow began to fall, the blossoms of the apple began to open."); May 19, 1853  ("The days of the golden willow are over for this season; their withered catkins strew the causeways and cover the water and also my boat, which is moored beneath them. ") See also A Book of Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau. Willows on the Causeway.   Compare May 18, 1853 ("A singular effect produced by a mass of ferns at a little distance, some rods square, their light yellow green tops seen above the dark masses of their fruit. ")

The clump of golden 

willows west of new stone bridge 

handsome seen from hill.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The clump of golden willows west of new stone bridge 

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

That singular springlike note of a bird which I heard once before about this time

February 17

The river very high, one inch higher than the evening of January 31st. The bridge at Sam Barrett’s caved in; also the Swamp Bridge on back road. Muskrats driven out. 

Hear this morning, at the new stone bridge, from the hill, that singular springlike note of a bird which I heard once before one year about this time (under Fair Haven Hill). 

February 17, 2024

The jays are uttering their unusual notes, and this makes me think of a woodpecker. It reminds me of the pine warbler, vetter vetter vetter vetter vet, except that it is much louder, and I should say has the sound of l rather than t, — veller, etc., perhaps. Can it be a jay? or a pigeon woodpecker? 

Is it not the earliest springward note of a bird? In the damp misty air. 

Was waked up last night by the tolling of a bell about 11 o’clock, as if a child had hold of the rope. Dressed and went abroad in the wet to see if it was a fire. It seems the town clock was out of order, and the striking part ran down and struck steadily for fifteen minutes. If it had not been so near the end of the week, it might have struck a good part of the night.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, February 17, 1855

Muskrats driven out. See February 17, 1857 ("The river is fairly breaking up, and men are out with guns after muskrats."); February 24, 1860 ("The river risen and quite over the meadows yesterday and to-day, and musquash begun to be killed. ") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Musquash

That singular springlike note of a bird which I heard once before one year about this time. See March 13, 1853 (“But what was that familiar spring sound from the pine wood across the river, a sharp vetter vetter vetter vetter,”); February 14, 1854 ("This greater liveliness of the birds methinks I have noticed commonly in warm, thawing days toward spring"); February 18, 1857 (“When I step out into the yard I hear that earliest spring note from some bird, perhaps a pigeon woodpecker (or can it be a nuthatch, whose ordinary note I hear?), the rapid whar whar, whar whar, whar whar, which I have so often heard before any other note.”);  March 5, 1859 ("Going down-town this forenoon, I heard a white-bellied nuthatch on an elm within twenty feet, uttering peculiar notes and more like a song than I remember to have heard from it.. . .It was something like to-what what what what what, rapidly repeated, and not the usual gnah gnah; and this instant it occurs to me that this may be that earliest spring note which I hear, and have referred to a woodpecker! (This is before I have chanced to see a bluebird, blackbird, or robin in Concord this year.) It is the spring note of the nuthatch"); See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Signs of the Spring, The Spring Note of the Nuthatch abd A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Nuthatch

The jays are uttering their unusual notes. See October 11, 1856 ("In the woods I hear the note of the jay, a metallic, clanging sound, some times a mew. Refer any strange note to him.") See also  A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Blue Jay

Was waked up last night by the tolling of a bell.  See May 3, 1852 ("There is a grand, rich, musical echo trembling on the air long after the clock has ceased to strike, like a vast organ, filling the air with a trembling music like a flower of sound. Nature adopts it. Beautiful is sound.”)

February 17.  See  A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, February 17

The first springlike note

at the stone bridge from the hill

in the misty air.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, That singular springlike note

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

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