The Natural History of Selborne

• 1791: August 4, 1791 – Farmer Tull begins to reap wheat.  The hop-garden at Kimber’s fails again, & looks black.
• 1789: August 4, 1789 – Sedum Telephim, orpine, & Hypericum Androsaemum, tutsan, growing in Emshot lane leading to Hawkey mill.
• 1784: August 4, 1784 – Skimmed my two pasture-fields.
• 1783: August 4, 1783 – Wheat seems very good.  Hops are quite gone.  They have some weak side-shoots without any rudiments of bloom.
• 1780: August 4, 1780 – Several broods of blackbirds & thrushes devour the currans, &c.: ’til the wild cherries are eaten they do not annoy the garden.
• 1775: August 4, 1775 – Little wheat housed.  Wheat is very fine in general.  A young cuckow is hatched every year in some part of Mrs Snooke’s outlet, most usually by red-breasts.  No cross-bills this year among the scotch pines. They usually appear about the beginning of July.  No fern-owls.
• 1774: August 4, 1774 – Swifts began to withdraw about this time at Blackburn in Lancashire.
• 1772: August 4, 1772 – Young black-caps abound, & eat the rasps. Trimmed the vines of their side-shoots.

• 1791: August 3, 1791 – Somewhat of a chilly feel begins to prevail in the mornings and evenings.  Sowed a pint of London prickly spinage seed to stand the winter.  The same quantity last year produced an incredible crop.  Trod & rolled in the seed.  In Mr Hale’s hop garden near Dell are several hills containing male plants, which now shed their farina: the female plants begin to blow.  Men hoe turnips, & hack pease.  Men house hay as black as old thatch.
• 1789: August 3, 1789 – Wheat reaped at Ropley.  Ripening weather.  Ant-flies begin to come forth on their business of emigration.
• 1786: August 3, 1786 – The fallows of good husbandmen are in a fine crumbling state, & very clean.  Sowed a crop of prickly-seeded spinage to stand the winter: the ground was very hard & cloddy, & would not rake; so we levelled it down as well as we could with a garden-roller, & sprinkled it over with fine, dustly mould to cover the seeds.
• 1785: August 3, 1785 – Harvest-bugs are troublesome.  Fly-catcher in Mr Mulso’s garden, that seem to have a nest of young. Tremella nostoch abounds in Mr Mulso’s grass walks.
• 1783: August 3, 1783 – My white pippins come-in for kitchen uses.  The aphides, of various species, that make many trees & plants appear loathsome, have served their generation, & are gone, no more to be seen this year; perhaps are all dead.  Thistle-down flies.
• 1781: August 3, 1781 – Now the ants, male, female, & workers, come forth from under my stairs by thousands.
• 1775: August 3, 1775 – Female viper taken full of young, 15 in number: gaped & menaced as soon as they were out of the belly of their dams.
• 1774: August 3, 1774 – First apricots: first french-beans.
• 1772: August 3, 1772 – Red-breast sings.  Hops are perfectly free from distemper, & promise a moderate crop.
• 1770: August 3, 1770 – Sweet day.  Vast dew.  Somewhat of an autumnal temperament seems to take place.  Young martins come out.  Young swifts seem to be out.
• 1768: August 3, 1768 – The whame, or barrel-fly of Derham, lays nits or eggs on the legs and sides of horses at grass.  See physicotheology.

Notes: The ‘see physico-theology’ note refers to Physico-theology, Or, A Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God, from His Works of Creation by William Derham a clergyman/naturalist like White and first person to systematically measure the speed of sound. Click the link for a facsimile of the whame-fly passage.

• 1791: August 2, 1791 – Sowed white turnip radishes.  Planted-out savoys, & other winter cabbages.
• 1789: August 2, 1789 – The goose-berries are bent to the ground with loads of fruit.
• 1788: August 2, 1788 – Many bats breed under the tiles of my house.  Five gallons, & one pint of brandy from London.
• 1784: August 2, 1784 – Wall-cherries, may dukes, lasted ’till this time, & were very fine.
• 1783: August 2, 1783 – Burning sun.  Workmen complain of the heat.
• 1780: August 2, 1780 – Papilio Machaon alis caudatis, concoloribus, flavis, limbo fusco, lunulis flavis, angulo ani fulvo, appears in my garden, being the first specimen of this species that I ever saw in this district.  In Essex & Sussex they are more common.  A person brought me a young snipe from the forest.
• 1777: August 2, 1777 – After ewes & lambs are shorn there is great confusion & bleating, neither the dams nor the young being able to distinguish one another as before.  This embarrassment seems not so much to arise from the loss of fleece, which may occasion an alteration in their appearance, as from the defect of that notus odor, discriminating each individual personally: which also is confounded by the strong scent of the pitch & tar wherewith they are newly marked; for the brute creation recognize each other more from the smell that the sight; & in matters of Identity & Diversity appeal much more to their noses than to their eyes.
• 1775: August 2, 1775 – Wheat harvest is general all about the downs.  When I came just beyond Findon I found wheatear traps which had been open’d about a week.  The shepherds usually begin catching about the last week in July.
• 1774: August 2, 1774 – Sun, sweet day.  A chilly autumnal feel in the mornings and evenings.
• 1773: August 2, 1773 – Apis manicata.  This bee is never observed by me ’til the Stachys germanica blows, on which it feeds all day: tho’ doubtless it had other plants to feed on before I introduced that Stachys.
• 1772: August 2, 1772 – Ground well moistened.  The frogs from James Kinght’s ponds travel in troops to the top of the Hanger.
• 1769: August 2, 1769 – Male-ants flie away & leave yir nests.

Great beech tree at Selborne, blogger included.

• 1792: August 1, 1792 – Floods out in several parts of the kingdom, & much hay & corn destroyed. Young buzzards follow their dams with a piping, wailing noise.
• 1791: August 1, 1791 – Gathered our whole crop of apricots, being one large fine fruit.
• 1790: August 1, 1790 – The circumference of trees in my outlet planted by myself, at one foot from the ground.
  Oak by alcove in 1730: 4′ 5”;
  Ash by Do. in 1730: 4′ 6 1/2”;
  Great fir, bakers hill, 1751: 5′ 0”;
  Greatest beech, 1751: 4′ 0”;
  Elm, 1750: 5′ 3”;
  Lime over at Mr Hale’s planted by me in 1756: 5′ 5”;
  My single great oak in the meadow, age unknown: 10′ 6 1/2”;
  The diameter of it’s boughs three ways is 24 yards, or 72 feet: circumference of it’s boughs 72 yards.
  Mr White’s single great oak at Newton measures at one foot above the ground 12 feet 6 inch: the exact dimensions of that belonging to, & planted by Mr Marsham.  A vast ree must that be at Stratton to have been planted by a person now living!
• 1789: August 1, 1789 – Strong wind in the night which has injured the hops; & particularly farmer Spencer’s in Culver croft.  Trenched out several rows of celeri; but the plants are of a red ugly colour, & seem not to be of a good sort.  The seed came from the gardener at Alton.
• 1787: August 1, 1787 – Several golden-crowned wrens appear in the tall fir-tree at the upper end of Baker’s hill: they were probably bred in that tree.
• 1786: August 1, 1786 – The poor begin to glean wheat.  The country looks very rich, being finely diversifyed with crops of corn of various sorts, & colours.
• 1785: August 1, 1785 – All the way as we drove along, we saw wheat harvest beginning.  The ponds at Privet, where they have been much distressed for water, are nearly full.  The down-wheat, about Meonstroke a poor crop.  Many turnips fail.  The fly-catchers hover over their young to preserve them from the heat of the sun.
• 1783: August 1, 1783 – Much smut in some fields of wheat.  Goody Hampton left the garden to go gleaning.  Barley cut about the forest-side.  We shot in all about 30 blackbirds.  Vast shooting star from E. to N.  My nephew Sam Barker came from Rutland thro’ London by the coaches.
• 1782: August 1, 1782 – Timothy the tortoise weighed seven pounds & three ounces.
• 1781: August 1, 1781 – The honey-bees suck the goose-berries, where the birds have broke the skin.
• 1780: August 1, 1780 – Much latter-grass in delicate order.  Wheat turns very fast.  Old wheat rises in price.
• 1777: August 1, 1777 – Reared the roof of my new building.
  Insert:
  On July 29 such vast rains fell about Iping, Bramshot, Haslemere, &c. that they tore vast holes in the turnpike-roads, covered several meadows with sand, & silt, blowed-up the heads of several ponds, carryed away part of the country-bridge at Iping, & the garden walls of the paper mill, & endangered the mill & house.  A paper-mill near Haselmere was ruined, & many 100 ae damaage sustained.  Much hay was sewpt away down the rivers, & some lives were lost.  A post-boy was drowned near Haselmere, & an other as he was passing from Farnham to Alton: the Gent: in the chaise saved himself by swimming.  These torrents were local; for at Lewes, which lies about the middle of the country of Sussex, they had a very wet time, but experienced none of these devastations.
• 1776: August 1, 1776 – We destroyed a strong wasp’s nest, consisting of many combs: there were young in all gradations, from fresh-laid eggs to young wasps emerging from their aurelia state; many of which came forth after we had kept the combs ’til the next day.  Where a martin’s nest was broken that contained fledge young: the dams immediately repaired the breach, no doubt with a view to a second brood.
• 1775: August 1, 1775 – Small rain, sun, & clouds.
• 1774: August 1, 1774 – Wheat cutting near Whorwel: much lodged.  Swifts flie up to the tower, & cling against the walls: qu: are not those young ones that do so?
• 1773: August 1, 1773 – Turneps thrive at a vast rate; a fine crop.  A prospect of much after-grass.
• 1772: August 1, 1772 – Clouds of dust attend the drags and harrows.  Great rain.  No such rain at this place since June 6th.
• 1770: August 1, 1770 – Hay makes in the afternoon.  Cocked ye hay.  Martins (young) peep out of their nests.  Bulfinches devour all the rasps.  Ricked last load of hay in fine order.
• 1768: August 1, 1768 – Rock-like clouds.  Oats & pease are cutting.

• 1792: July 31, 1792 – The young Hirundines begin to congregate on the tower.  How punctual are these birds in all their proceedings!
• 1791: July 31, 1791 – “On the last day of this month my Fathr Mr Ben Wh. shot in his own garden at S. Lambeth, a Loxia curvisrostra, or Cross bill, as it was feeding on the cones of his Scotch firs.  There were six, four cocks, & two hens: what he shot was a cock, which was beautifull variegated with brown, & green, & a great deal of red: it answered very accurately to Willughby’s description; & weighed rather more than 1 ounce & an half.  In the evening the five remaining birds were seen to fly over the garden, making a chearful note.”  Thus far Mrs Ben White.  To which we add that flights of Cross bills used to frequent Mrs Snooke’s scotch firs in the month of July only.  Mr Ray says, “per autumnum interdum sed rarius in Angliam venit, non autem apud nos perennat aut ndificat.”  Synopsis.
• 1789: July 31, 1789 – Louring, vast rain, blowing.  This rain was very great at Malpas, in Chesire.
• 1787: July 31, 1787 – Vast rain, an inch & a quarter in 8 hours.
• 1785: July 31, 1785 – Hops begin to form on their poles: but the gardens in general, fall off, & look lousey, since the rains.
• 1783: July 31, 1783 – The after-grass in the great meadow burns.  The sheep-down burns & is rusty. Much water in the pond on the hill!  This morning Will Tanner shot, off the tall meris-trees in the great mead, 17 young black-birds.  The cherries of these trees amuse the birds & save the garden-fruit.
• 1780: July 31, 1780 – Dined at Bramshot.  Turnips flourish on the sands.  Mr Richardon’s garden at Bramshot-place abounds with fruit.
• 1775: July 31, 1775 – Horses at plow so teized by flies as to be quite frantic.  Horses are never tormenteed in that manner ’til after midsumr: the people say it is the nose-fly that distracts them so.  I can discover only such flies as haunt the heads of horses: perhaps at this season they lay their eggs in the nose & ears.  I never can discern any oestrus on those days, only swarms of small muscae.
• 1773: July 31, 1773 – The lightening beat down a chimney on the Barnet: no person was hurt.  Measles still about.
  * Thro’ this month the Caprimulgi are busy every evening in catching the solstitial chafers which abound on chalky soils on the tops of hills.  These birds certainly do, as I suspected last year, take these insects with their feet, & pick them to pieces as they flie along, & so pouch them for their young.  Any person that has a quick eye may see them bend their heads downwards, & push out their short feet forwards as they pull their prey to pieces.  The chafer may also be discerned in their claws.  The serrated claw threfore on their longest toe is no doubt for the purpose of holding their prey.  This is the only insectivorous bird that I know which takes it’s prety flying with it’s feet.
• 1772: July 31, 1772 – The ground dryed to powder.
• 1771: July 31, 1771 – Considerable rain in the night.  Clap of thunder.  Showers about.

• 2008: July 19 – <?php OTDList(); ?>
• 1792: July 30, 1792 – Mr Churton left us, & went to Waverley.
• 1791: July 30, 1791 – Made black curran-jelly.  Finished cutting the tall hedges.  Gathered some lavender.
• 1789: July 30, 1789 – John Hale brings home a waggon-load of woollen-rags, which are to be strewed on this hop-grounds in the spring, & dug in as manure.  These rags weighed at ton weight & cost brought home near six pounds.  They came from Gosport.
• 1788: July 30, 1788 – Some workmen, reapers, are made sick by the heat.  Much wheat bound. Some housed by John Carpenter.
• 1787: July 30, 1787 – Wheat-harvest will be backward.  Mr White’s tank at Newton runds over; but Captain Dumaresque’s, which is much larger, is not full.
• 1786: July 30, 1786 – Some hop-gardens injured by the wind of yesterday. Arichokes so dried-up that they do not head well.
• 1785: July 30, 1785 – Boys bring the 8th & 9th wasps nest.  Pyramidal campanula blows.
• 1783: July 30, 1783 – Few hazel-nuts.  Men house field-pease.  Ponds are dry.  Grass-walks burn.  Ripening weather.
• 1781: July 30, 1781 – The ants, male, female, & workers, come forth from under my stairs by thousands.
• 1780: July 30, 1780 – Young snipes were seen at the Bishop of Winchester’s table at Farnham-castle on this day: they are bred on all the moory-heaths of this neighbourhood.
• 1777: July 30, 1777 – Pond-heads are blown-up: & roads torn by the torrents.  Great flood at Gracious street.  Several mills are damaged.  Hay drowned.  Finished the walls of my new parlor.
• 1776: July 30, 1776 – Peacocks begin to moult & cast their splendid train. Total eclipse of the moon.
• 1775: July 30, 1775 – By this evenings post I am informed, by a Gent. who is just come from thence that the hops all round Canterbury have failed:  there are many hundred acres not worth picking.
• 1772: July 30, 1772 – Vast aurora borealis.
• 1771: July 30, 1771 – Sun chilly.  Cold white dew.  Rain.
• 1770: July 30, 1770 – Cut my little mead.  Vines in bloom.  Showers about.

Apologies for the missed post yesterday; having a hectic time at the moment.

• 2008: July 30 – <?php OTDList(); ?>
  Apologies for the missed post yesterday; having a hectic time at the moment.
• 1792: July 30, 1792 – Mr Churton left us, & went to Waverley.
• 1791: July 30, 1791 – Made black curran-jelly.  Finished cutting the tall hedges.  Gathered some lavender.
• 1789: July 30, 1789 – John Hale brings home a waggon-load of woollen-rags, which are to be strewed on this hop-grounds in the spring, & dug in as manure.  These rags weighed at ton weight & cost brought home near six pounds.  They came from Gosport.
• 1788: July 30, 1788 – Some workmen, reapers, are made sick by the heat.  Much wheat bound. Some housed by John Carpenter.
• 1787: July 30, 1787 – Wheat-harvest will be backward.  Mr White’s tank at Newton runds over; but Captain Dumaresque’s, which is much larger, is not full.
• 1786: July 30, 1786 – Some hop-gardens injured by the wind of yesterday. Arichokes so dried-up that they do not head well.
• 1785: July 30, 1785 – Boys bring the 8th & 9th wasps nest.  Pyramidal campanula blows.
• 1783: July 30, 1783 – Few hazel-nuts.  Men house field-pease.  Ponds are dry.  Grass-walks burn.  Ripening weather.
• 1781: July 30, 1781 – The ants, male, female, & workers, come forth from under my stairs by thousands.
• 1780: July 30, 1780 – Young snipes were seen at the Bishop of Winchester’s table at Farnham-castle on this day: they are bred on all the moory-heaths of this neighbourhood.
• 1777: July 30, 1777 – Pond-heads are blown-up: & roads torn by the torrents.  Great flood at Gracious street.  Several mills are damaged.  Hay drowned.  Finished the walls of my new parlor.
• 1776: July 30, 1776 – Peacocks begin to moult & cast their splendid train. Total eclipse of the moon.
• 1775: July 30, 1775 – By this evenings post I am informed, by a Gent. who is just come from thence that the hops all round Canterbury have failed:  there are many hundred acres not worth picking.
• 1772: July 30, 1772 – Vast aurora borealis.
• 1771: July 30, 1771 – Sun chilly.  Cold white dew.  Rain.
• 1770: July 30, 1770 – Cut my little mead.  Vines in bloom.  Showers about.

• 1790: July 28, 1790 – Children gather strawberries every morning from the hanger where the tall beeches were felled in winter 1788.
• 1789: July 28, 1789 – Lapwings leave the bogs, & moors in large flocks, & frequent the uplands.
• 1788: July 28, 1788 – Two swifts sipping the surface of Bin’s pond.  The bed of Oakhanger pond covered with large muscle shells.  The stint, or summer snipe.  Large flock of lapwings in the Forest.
• 1783: July 28, 1783 – Wasps swarm so that we were obliged to gather-in all the cherries under the net.
• 1781: July 28, 1781 – Gleaners bring home bundles of corn.  The black-birds, & thrushes come from the woods in troops to plunder my garden.  We shot 30 blackbirds, & thrushes.  The white-throats are bold thieves; nor are the red-breasts at all honest with respect to currans.  Birds are guided by colour, & do not touch any white fruits ’til they have cleared all the red; they eat the red grapes, rasps, currans, & goose-berries first.
• 1780: July 28, 1780 – Vast crops of cow-grass. Much hay made. Vast lights in the air from all quarters.  Crickets swarm in my kitchen-chimney.
  *  The flies, called by our people Nose flies, torment the horses at plow.  They lay their eggs in the ears as well as the noses of cattle.  Some of our farmer’s work their teams with little baskets tyed-on over the horses noses.  These flies seem to prevail only in Italy.  Round the eaves of the Priory farmhouse are 40 martins-nests, which have sent forth their first brood in swarms, At 4 young to a nest only, the first brood will produce 160; & the second the same, which together make 320: add to these the 40 pairs of old ones, which make in all 400; a vast flight for one house!! The first, when congregating on the tiles, covers one side of the roof!
• 1778: July 28, 1778 – Wallnuts & hazel-nuts abound. One bank-martin at Combwood-pond: the only one I ever saw so far from the forest.
• 1777: July 28, 1777 – Lime trees in full bloom: on these the bees gather much honey.
• 1775: July 28, 1775 – Ten nests of wasps have been destroy’d just at hand: they abound & are ploughed up every day.
• 1772: July 28, 1772 – Veratrum rubrum.  Brother John arrived at Gravesend in 37 days from Cadiz.  He went from Gibraltar to Cadiz by land to get a ship.  Ponds fail.  Wheat turns.  Hardly any rain at Selb.
• 1769: July 28, 1769 – The showers do not at all moisten the ground, which remains as hard as iron.  No savoys, endives, &c. can be planted-out.
• 1768: July 28, 1768 – Gathered frenchbeans.

• 1790: July 27, 1790 – Honey-dews, which make the planters in pain for their hops.  Hops are infested with aphides; look badly.
• 1789: July 27, 1789 – Farmer Spence & Farmer Knight are beginning to lime their respective farms at Grange & Norton.
• 1788: July 27, 1788 – We have had a few chilly mornings & evenings, which have sent off the swifts.  I have remarked before, many times, how early they are in their retreat. Surely they must be influenced by the failure of some particular insect, which ceases to fly thus early, being checked by the first cool autumnal sensations; since their congeners will not depart yet thses eight or nine weeks.
• 1787: July 27, 1787 – Rooks in vast flocks return to the deep woods at half past 8 o’clock in the evening.
• 1786: July 27, 1786 – Saw a nightingale.  Stifling dust.
• 1783: July 27, 1783 – My china-holly-hocks, after standing a year or two, lose all their fine variegated appearance, & turn to good common sorts, being double, & deeply coloured.
• 1782: July 27, 1782 – Vast rain.  Swllows-nests with their young washed down the chimney.
• 1780: July 27, 1780 – Tortoise eats gooseberries.
• 1779: July 27, 1779 – Planted out in trenches four rows of celeri.
• 1778: July 27, 1778 – Few turnips are yet sown: they were prevented first by the dry weather, & then by the rain.
• 1774: July 27, 1774 – Turned out the worst of my St foin for thatch for my rick.
• 1773: July 27, 1773 – Some wheat seems to be blighted.
• 1772: July 27, 1772 – Small shower at Selbrone.  Young swallows abound.
• 1771: July 27, 1771 – Cucumbers begin to bear again.
• 1769: July 27, 1769 – Some grapes are got pretty large.  Finished cutting the small hedges.

• 1792: July 26, 1792 – This cool, shady summer is not good for mens fallows, which are heavy, & weedy. Lettuces have not loaved, or bleached well this summer.
• 1791: July 26, 1791 – Mrs Henry White, & Lucy came from Fyfield.
• 1789: July 26, 1789 – By observing two glow-worms, which were brought from the field to the bank in the garden, it appeared to us, that those little creatures put-out their lamps between eleven & twelve, & shine no more for the rest of the night.
• 1788: July 26, 1788 – The fields are now finely diversfyed with ripe corn, hay & harvest scenes, & hops. The whole country round is a charming land-scape,& puts me in mind of the following lovely lines in the first book of the Cyder of John Phillips.
  “Nor are the hills unamiable, whose tops/
  To heaven aspire, affording prospect sweet/
  To human ken; nor at their feet the vales/
  Descending gently, where the lowing herd/
  Chews verdurous pasture; nor the yellow fields/
  Gaily interchang’d, with rich variety/
  Pleasing; as when an Emerald green enchas’d/
  In flamy gold, from the bright mass acquires/
  A nobler hue, more delicate to sight.”
• 1787: July 26, 1787 – The farmers talk much that wheat is blighted. Kidney-beans do not thrive.
• 1785: July 26, 1785 – By frequent picking we have much reduced the Cocci on the vines.  Vast storm of thunder, & rain at Thursley, which damaged the crops.  Thursley is in Surrey, to the N.E. of us.
• 1783: July 26, 1783 – Some wheat reaped at Faringdon.  Boys bring two more wasps nests.
• 1781: July 26, 1781 – The blackbirds & thrushes, that have devoured all the wild cherries in the meadow, now begin to plunder the garden.
• 1780: July 26, 1780 – Vast fog at sea, over the Sussex-downs.
• 1776: July 26, 1776 – Cut the grass in the little meadow.  Hay makes well.  Hops fill their poles, & throw-out lateral shoots.
• 1774: July 26, 1774 – Finished my meadow-hay in good order: St foin spoiled.
• 1772: July 26, 1772 – Fine shower in the night.  Distant thunder.  Frogs migrate in myriads from the ponds.
• 1771: July 26, 1771 – Turneps fail in many places, & are sown over again.
• 1770: July 26, 1770 – Turneps begin to be hoed.  Red-breast’s note begins to be distinguishable, other birds being more silent.
• 1768: July 26, 1768 – Threat’ning clouds at a distance, but most delicate ripening weather.