The Natural History of Selborne

Vast showers about to the S.E. & N.W.  Dust hardly laid in the roads.

Some thunder & hail.  Smart showers.

Frequent sprinklings, but not enough all day to lay the dust.  The dry fit has lasted six weeks this day.

Scarabaeus solstitialis. The fern-owl preys on the fern-chafer.

The grass-walks burnt to powder.

Lime blows, & smells sweetly, & is much frequented by bees.

Barley & pease suffer much. Frogs continue to migrate from the ponds.

Drought has continued five weeks this day.  Watered the rasp and annuals well.

* There is a sort of wild bee frequenting the garden-campion for the sake of its tomentum, which probably it turns to some purpose in the business of nidification.  It is very pleasant to see with what address it strips off the pubes, running from the top to the bottom of a branch, & shaving it bare with all the dexterity of a hoop-shaver.  When it has got a vast bundle, almost as large as itself, it flies away, holding it secure between it’s chin and it’s forelegs.

Woodstrawberries come.  Rasps begin to ripen.  Sprinking shower.  Showers at a distance.

Meadow-hay begins to be cut.  Some barley in ear: wheat uneven.  Watered annuals.  Finished cutting the tall hedges.