May is the turning point — the spring migration tapers as the breeding season hits full stride, the bluebonnets give way to the tougher summer wildflowers, and the first Hill Country peaches and Valley tomatoes start showing up at the market. The warm nights bring the Milky Way back to the southeast.
Week by week in May
April 30 – May 6
- Breeding season is in full swing; scissor-tailed flycatchers nest on prairies and the first streaky fledglings appear at feeders.
- Indian blanket, black-eyed Susan, and Mexican hat peak across the Blackland Prairie and East Texas fields.
- Hill Country peaches and early tomatoes hit the markets; set out heat-loving okra, eggplant, and Southern peas now.
- The Eta Aquariid meteors, debris from Halley's Comet, peak in early May; look low in the east before dawn.
May 7–13
- Painted buntings and black-chinned hummingbirds are busy at nests; watch for begging fledgling cardinals and mockingbirds in yards.
- Firewheel and Mexican hat color the prairies while winecup trails over limestone in the Hill Country.
- Tomatoes and the first Texas 1015 onions fill markets; mulch deeply and water early as days lengthen and warm.
- The Summer Triangle of Vega, Deneb, and Altair clears the eastern horizon late at night, a preview of summer skies.
May 14–20
- Scissor-tailed flycatchers hawk insects over open country and painted buntings sing all morning from brushy fence rows.
- Black-eyed Susan and Indian blanket peak; Mexican hat and the season's first Gulf-coast flowers brighten roadsides.
- Hill Country peaches ripen in the Fredericksburg orchards; in the garden, harvest tomatoes and keep okra and peppers watered.
- Scorpius rises in the southeast late evening, its bright reddish heart-star Antares low above the horizon.
May 21–27
- Coastal rookery islands roar with nesting herons, egrets, skimmers, and terns at the height of the breeding season.
- Indian blanket and Mexican hat hold strong on roadsides; black-eyed Susan brightens East Texas fields and prairie remnants.
- Pick peaches fragrant and slightly soft; in the garden, side-dress okra and Southern peas and harvest summer squash daily.
- The Summer Triangle climbs the eastern sky after dark as Scorpius and the curving Teapot of Sagittarius follow behind it.
May 28 – June 3
- Golden-cheeked warblers wrap up their only-in-Texas breeding season; black-chinned hummingbirds dominate central and west Texas feeders.
- Firewheel, black-eyed Susan, and Mexican hat carry the prairies into summer; winecup deepens on Hill Country slopes.
- Tomatoes, peaches, watermelon, and 1015 onions crowd the markets; plant heat-lovers and mulch everything against the rising heat.
- The Milky Way core rises in the southeast late at night through Sagittarius and Scorpius, best from dark West Texas skies.
Birds This Month
The great rush of April eases in May, but the first half of the month still carries the tail of spring migration up the coast. Late-moving species are the May specialty — blackpoll warblers, mourning warblers, yellow-billed cuckoos, common nighthawks, and flights of Mississippi kites kettling overhead — and a late front at High Island or Bolivar can still drop a fallout into the first week or two. By the time of month's end, the woodlots have gone quiet as the migrants reach the north.
Inland, May is when the breeders take over the soundtrack. Painted and indigo buntings sing all morning from brushy edges, scissor-tailed flycatchers are nesting on the prairies, and dickcissels chant their buzzy name from every fenceline across the Blackland Prairie. In the Hill Country, the endangered golden-cheeked warbler and the black-capped vireo are deep in their only-in-Texas breeding season.
Hummingbird life settles into summer too — black-chinned hummingbirds nest across central and west Texas and ruby-throated hummingbirds hold the east. On the coast, the rookery islands are loud with nesting herons, egrets, roseate spoonbills, skimmers, and terns, and the resident scissor-tailed flycatchers and painted buntings have young to feed.
This month's tip: shift from chasing migrants to learning songs. By late May the best birding is by ear at dawn — every singing male is a breeding bird on territory, and a shaded water feature in the yard will pull them in once the heat builds by mid-morning.
What's Blooming
By May the bluebonnets have gone to seed, and the prairies hand off to the tougher, longer-lasting summer wildflowers. The roadsides flush red-and-yellow as Indian blanket (firewheel) opens its pinwheels statewide, often woven through the lemon-yellow of plains coreopsis. Black-eyed Susan begins its run across the Blackland Prairie and east Texas, and the little sombrero-shaped Mexican hat lines dry roadsides everywhere.
The Hill Country keeps its own May palette — deep magenta winecup trailing over limestone, the last winecup and prairie verbena in the swales, and the first purple horsemint (lemon beebalm) coming up in the grass. Along the coast, firewheel carpets the dunes and the beach evening primrose holds the sand.
Where to see it: the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin moves into its summer-flower peak, and any untended roadside or prairie remnant in the eastern two-thirds of the state will be in color. Early morning, before the heat builds, is both the best light for the flowers and the busiest time for the bees and butterflies working them.
Garden This Month
May is the pivot from spring planting to summer survival. In the cooler north of the state there's still a real window for warm-season crops, but across most of Texas the job is shifting to the short list that actually thrives in heat: okra, Southern (cowpea) peas, sweet potatoes, eggplant, peppers, and Malabar spinach all do well set out or sown now. Tomatoes set fruit poorly once nights stay above the mid-70s, so harvest your spring crop steadily and aim to keep the plants healthy for a fall comeback.
The three habits that carry a Texas garden into summer all start now: mulch two to three inches deep to slow evaporation and cool the soil, water deeply and less often to push roots down, and water early in the day so foliage dries before night. In the flower bed, plant zinnias, cosmos, sunflowers, and salvia for the pollinators, and keep newly planted natives watered through their first hot summer.
Zone 8a (north & north-central Texas): spring tomatoes and peppers are fruiting now — keep them watered deeply — and there's still time to direct-sow heat-lovers like okra, Southern peas, and sweet-potato slips for a strong summer crop. Mulch everything as the soil starts to warm in earnest.
Zone 8b (central Texas): the heat is closing the tomato window, so harvest steadily and shift to okra, Southern peas, eggplant, sweet potato, and Malabar spinach, which all prefer the warmth that's coming. Plant in the cool of the morning and water deeply.
Zone 9a (Gulf coast & south): it's already hot — focus on okra, Southern peas, sweet potato, and peppers, and begin planning the fall tomato transplants you'll set out in mid-summer for an autumn crop before the first cool nights return.
Zone 9b (deep south Texas): garden in the cool of the morning, lean hard on okra, Southern peas, and peppers, and keep new plantings shaded and well watered until they're established against the building heat.
What's at the Farmers Market
May is when the Texas summer market begins to fill out. The first Hill Country peaches from the Fredericksburg and Stonewall orchards arrive late in the month — choose fragrant fruit that gives slightly to a gentle squeeze, and ripen them on the counter before refrigerating. The first vine-ripe tomatoes appear too; store them stem-side down at room temperature, never in the refrigerator, which turns them mealy and dull.
Texas 1015 sweet onions are at their peak now, in from the Valley and mild enough to be the centerpiece of a dish rather than the background — keep them cool, dry, and away from potatoes. The last of the spring crops finish strong: squash, cucumbers, snap beans, new potatoes, carrots, and beets are all at the stalls, and the final Poteet strawberries are winding down (buy them fully red and refrigerate unwashed).
The earliest blackberries begin to show in east Texas as the month closes. Shop in the cool of the morning for the best selection, and buy fruit that smells like itself — fragrance is the most reliable sign of ripe spring-into-summer produce.
Night Sky This Month
May nights are warm and comfortable, and the Milky Way is on its way back. There's no major meteor shower this month, but the spring sky has its own quiet rewards. Overhead, the Big Dipper is high — follow its handle to arc to the bright orange star Arcturus in Boötes, then speed on to blue-white Spica in Virgo. Low in the southeast, the curved string of stars marking Scorpius rises with its red heart, Antares — one of the few constellations that genuinely looks like its name.
As the night goes on, the Summer Triangle — Vega, Deneb, and Altair — climbs the eastern sky, and from a truly dark site the core of the Milky Way begins to lift out of the southeast through Sagittarius and Scorpius in the hours after midnight. The warm, settled nights of late May make it one of the more pleasant months of the year to simply lie out and watch.
The Big Bend region and the Davis Mountains around the McDonald Observatory in West Texas hold some of the darkest skies in the Lower 48 and are unbeatable for the returning summer Milky Way. Planet positions shift from year to year — the printable Texas night-sky guide lists this year's specific viewing nights and where the planets sit from your latitude.
Butterflies & Pollinators
By May the resident butterfly broods are building toward their summer abundance. Gulf fritillaries — bright orange with silver-spangled underwings — are increasing on passionflower vines across the eastern and coastal state, and the larger swallowtails are everywhere: black swallowtails laying on dill, fennel, and parsley in gardens, pipevine swallowtails flashing iridescent blue along wooded edges, and big yellow giant and tiger swallowtails drifting through.
The spring monarch migration is past its peak — most have moved north to breed — but queens, their close cousins, are increasing and working the milkweed and frostweed. The native milkweed greening up now feeds those queens and builds the nectar supply for the big fall monarch push back through Texas in October.
To bring them in: plant native milkweed (antelope-horns and green milkweed are well suited to Texas), passionflower for the fritillaries, and a steady nectar succession of lantana, mistflower, salvia, and zinnia. A shallow puddling spot of damp sand or mud will draw the males in to drink on warm afternoons.
Trees This Month
The canopy is fully closed by May, and the trees settle into their long green summer. The pecan — the state tree and the last to leaf out — is now in full leaf and beginning to set its small green nutlets, which will swell through the summer toward an October harvest. Live oaks carry their deep, settled green, having finished their late-winter leaf exchange months ago.
A few trees are still flowering. The southern magnolia opens its big, lemon-scented white blooms across east Texas and the older neighborhoods, and the catalpa hangs out its white, frilly clusters. In the Hill Country and west, mesquite carries its cream-colored flower spikes and the first long seed pods, while along the spring-fed rivers the bald cypress is at its soft, feathery best — months from its rusty November color but at its most graceful now, shading the streams that make a Texas summer bearable.
Weather & Daylight
Across Texas, a typical May day averages a high near 86°F and a low near 61°F, with about 3.3 inches of precipitation — statewide averages from the 1991–2020 U.S. climate normals.
Heat starts building toward 86 with muggy nights near 61, and heavier storms bring the wettest month of the year.
| Average high | 86°F |
|---|---|
| Average low | 61°F |
| Precipitation | 3.3 in |
| Sunrise (mid-month) | 6:35 CT |
| Sunset (mid-month) | 20:19 CT |
Figures are statewide averages over the 1991–2020 U.S. climate normals; local conditions vary with elevation and distance from the coast. Sunrise and sunset are computed for a midstate point on the 15th (CT).
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Same month elsewhere: May in Utah · May in Vermont · May in Virginia