1889
(May 10)
were in the taller maples flying from tree to tree and
occasionally scaling down into the tangle about Heron Pool.
I looked for nests but could find none. Perhaps they
come to this swamp for mud!
  In the east grove I shot two Least Flycatchers and missed
a third. There were three Crows here, apparently hunting
Robin's eggs, the shells of which I saw on the ground under
a nest.
  I next tried the north island. In some willows on its
northern edge I came upon an interesting little company
of birds including four D. coronata, one D. striata and one
Vireo gilvus. In the button bushes just outside I saw a
D. maculosa and a Sylvania pusilla.
  Nothing of interest in the willow openings near the
railroad bridge over Alewife Brook. I looked closely there
for rails but could find no signs. Is it possible they
have wholly deserted the Fresh Pond marshes? Certainly
they are now rare there if found at all. Heard only one Swallow (H. horrificus)
  In the Brickyard Swamp I found Red-wings, Swamp
Sparrows, & Maryland Yellow-throats in fair numbers and
Yellow Warblers swarming. Shot four Least Flycatchers in the
tall willows at the east end of this swamp.
  In the Maple Swamp the trees and undergrowth were
delicate pale green, their leaves on the average perhaps 1/4 grown,
the foliage casting a slight shade but nowhere forming more
than a thin tracing against the sky. Tops of the maples
touched with red some of them bearing great clusters of
red keys. The white willows had the densest foliage; their
catkins, nearly all down, strewed the ground or water with
buffy brown, caterpillar like forms. Foliage of undergrowth
dense in places everything, even the tardy button bush, bursting
into leaf. Pyrus arbutifolia in flower. Royal fern & sarsaparilla
six to twelve inches high.
[margin]vegetation[/margin]