May 2

Posted by sydney on May 2nd, 2009
  • 1793: May 2, 1793 – Sad, blowing, wintry weather.  I think I saw an house martin.  There is a bird of the black-bird kind, with white on the breast, that haunts my outlet as if it had a nest there.  Is this a ring-ouzel?  If it is, it must be a great curiosity; because they have not been known to breed in these parts.
  • 1792: May 2, 1792 – Cut the leaves of Rhubarb for tarts: the tarts are very good.  Sent some of the leaves of the crocus’s to Edmd White: they make good tyings for hops, being tough, & pliant.
  • 1791: May 2, 1791 – Swifts, & house-martins over the Thames at Pangbourne.
  • 1789: May 2, 1789 – The long frost of last winter has proved very destructive to pond-fish the kingdom over, except in those pools & lakes thro’ which passed a constant current of water: nor did the expedient of breaking holes in the ice avail.  Mr Barker, who has been writing an account of the late frost, thinks that it did mischief.  A current of water introduces a constant current of fresh air, which refreshes continually the air of the pools & ponds, & renders it fit for respiration.
  • 1787: May 2, 1787 – The foliage of the peach, & nectarine-trees scorched by the winds: the leaves are shrivelled, & blotched.
  • 1786: May 2, 1786 – White frost, sun, cold air.
  • 1784: May 2, 1784 – No ring-ouzels this spring: the severity of the season probably disconcerted their proceedings.
  • 1782: May 2, 1782 – Two swifts at Nore hill passed by me at a steady rate towards this village as if they were just arrived.
  • 1781: May 2, 1781 – Field-crickets crink: this note is very summer-like, & chearful.
  • 1780: May 2, 1780 – Tortoise marches about: eats part of a piece of cucumber-paring.
  • 1776: May 2, 1776 – Some missle-thrushes on the down above us: blackbirds and thrushes mostly destroyed.
  • 1774: May 2, 1774 – There is a good bloom on the pear-trees.  Great bloom of cherries.
  • 1772: May 2, 1772 – Sand-martins abound at the sand-pit at short heath.
  • 1770: May 2, 1770 – Cuculus.  Swallows abound.  Great snowstorms.
  • 1769: May 2, 1769 – Cabbages begin to turn in.  Prawns plenty.

The songbirds ‘mostly destroyed’ in the 1776 entry by the long drought.
‘Cuculus’– cuckoo.
The 1782 entry is remarkable for a rare instance of White seeming to be able to envisage migration for swifts.
Surely it’s the rhubarb stalks in the 1792 tarts?

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