Washington Nature Guide: November 2026
November brings the gray, rainy onset of the Washington winter to the westside and the first deep cold and snow to the east — but the Skagit's swans, Snow Geese, and Bald Eagles are in full force, the Dungeness crab and oyster season is at its best, and the last larches gild the eastern slopes.
What to look for this week
- The Skagit flats roar with tens of thousands of wintering Snow Geese, Trumpeter and Tundra Swans, and Bald Eagles line the rivers below the salmon spawn.
- The Quadrantid meteor shower peaks in a brief, sharp burst around January 3 — watch the dark northeast after midnight from the dry country east of the Cascades.
- In the mild Puget lowland, keep harvesting overwintered kale, leeks, and parsnips between rains, and prune dormant apples and roses on a dry day.
- Western hemlock, redcedar, and Douglas-fir carry the gray westside landscape, their trunks furred with moss in the wettest weeks of the year.
Birds This Month
November is full winter-birding season. The Skagit and Stillaguamish flats hold tens of thousands of Snow Geese, plus Trumpeter and Tundra Swans and Cackling Geese, while Bald Eagles gather along the Skagit and Nooksack to feast on spawned-out salmon — the great November eagle spectacle near Rockport and Marblemount is building toward its peak. Raptors hunt the open ground: Rough-legged Hawks, Northern Harriers, Short-eared Owls at dusk on the Samish flats.
On the Salish Sea, the wintering sea ducks and alcids are in: Surf and White-winged Scoters, Long-tailed Ducks, Barrow's Goldeneye, Harlequin Ducks, Common Murres, Pigeon Guillemots, and three loon species. Westside feeders fill with juncos, chickadees, Varied Thrushes, Spotted Towhees, Golden-crowned Sparrows, and overwintering Anna's Hummingbirds, with possible irruptions of Pine Siskins and finches.
What's Blooming
November's wild bloom is essentially over, but the mild Puget lowland keeps a green, living winter landscape unlike most of the country. Evergreen salal, Oregon grape, sword fern, and licorice fern hold the forest floor, moss greens every trunk and roof, and in sheltered gardens the earliest winter heath, strawberry tree (Arbutus), and fall-blooming camellias open. The fragrant witch hazel and sweet box begin late in the month.
Structure and fruit carry the cold season: scarlet rose hips, the orange-red berries of Pacific madrone and mountain ash (feeding flocks of robins and waxwings), blue-black Oregon grape, white snowberry, and the bright winterberry and cotoneaster in gardens. East of the Cascades, the shrub-steppe is brown and frosted, sagebrush and rabbitbrush dormant under the early eastern snow, with no bloom for months.
Garden This Month
November is the wind-down west of the Cascades, but the maritime mildness means real harvest continues. Keep picking overwintered kale, chard, leeks, Brussels sprouts, parsnips, and carrots, sweetened by frost, and harvest the fall cabbage and broccoli. Finish planting garlic, tulips, and the last bare-root and container trees and shrubs early in the month. Mulch tender perennials and strawberry beds, rake and compost leaves, and protect young trees from voles.
Clean, sharpen, and oil the tools, drain hoses, and put the garden to bed for the wet season. On a dry day, you can still plant out hardy ornamentals in the warming-soil window. East of the Cascades, the cold and snow have shut the season down — the work there is finished mulching, drained irrigation, and protected perennials waiting under the early eastern snowpack until spring.
Zone 5b (eastern valleys & foothills): winter has arrived with frozen ground and early snow. Finish mulching perennials, drain and store the irrigation lines, and let the snowpack settle in to insulate the dormant beds.
Zone 7b (Puget lowland & coastal valleys): keep harvesting overwintered kale, leeks, chard, parsnips, and Brussels sprouts through the rain. Finish planting bulbs and bare-root stock, mulch tender perennials, and clean and store tools before the wettest months.
Zone 8a (Puget Sound shore & San Juan Islands): the mild maritime gardens keep producing greens and roots. Plant the last garlic and tulips, mulch the beds, and protect any borderline-hardy plants from the occasional sharp coastal cold snap.
What's at the Farmers Market
November markets and farm stands center on the harvest larder and the sea. Washington apples and pears from fresh storage are superb — Cosmic Crisp, Honeycrisp, Fuji, Anjou, Bosc — alongside winter squash, pumpkins, potatoes, carrots, beets, parsnips, celeriac, leeks, cabbage, and Brussels sprouts. Coastal cranberries from the Grayland and Long Beach bogs are at their peak for the holidays, with hazelnuts and chestnuts rounding out the stalls.
This is prime Dungeness crab season on the Salish Sea and the coast, and Pacific oysters from Willapa Bay and Hood Canal are at their cold-water best. Choose firm, heavy apples and store them cold; pick winter squash with hard rinds and store dry and cool; keep crab and oysters iced, tightly closed, and use them promptly. The remaining outdoor markets close for the season as winter markets take over indoors.
Night Sky This Month
November brings long, dark nights, though the westside rains make clear skies precious. The dark-sky strongholds remain east of the Cascades — Goldendale Observatory State Park above the Columbia Gorge, Sun Lakes–Dry Falls, and the Methow Valley — where cold, dry air gives sharp transparency on clear nights. Westside observers wait for a clearing front to glimpse the stars over the rain-soaked lowlands.
The sky shifts toward winter: the Great Square of Pegasus sinks west while Taurus with the Pleiades and orange Aldebaran climbs the east, and brilliant Orion clears the horizon late in the evening. The Leonid meteor shower peaks around mid-November, radiating from rising Leo after midnight. For this year's exact Leonid timing, planet positions, and aurora outlook for northern Washington, see the printable Washington night-sky guide.
Butterflies & Pollinators
By November, butterfly flight has essentially ceased across Washington as cold and rain take hold, but the insects are present, settled into winter. In the mild Puget lowland, the overwintering adults — Mourning Cloak, California Tortoiseshell, and anglewings (commas) — are tucked deep into woodpiles, loose bark, hollow trees, and unheated sheds, and only a freak warm spell could rouse one to a brief flight.
The rest of the state's butterflies wait in their winter stages, sheltered from the wet cold. Western Tiger and Anise Swallowtails overwinter as chrysalids fastened to twigs and bark, Sara Orangetip sleeps as a chrysalis on the dry eastern slopes, and fritillary and admiral caterpillars hibernate small and motionless in the leaf litter and along willow stems. East of the Cascades, the shrub-steppe butterflies are likewise dormant beneath the early snow, all of them weeks from any sign of spring.
Trees This Month
November strips the deciduous trees and returns Washington to its evergreen winter identity. The last bigleaf maple and cottonwood leaves fall in the lowlands, the vine maple finishes its scarlet display, and the red alder stands bare and gray along the creeks, already hanging next year's tiny catkins. East of the Cascades, the deciduous western larch drops its golden needles, leaving its spires bare among the green pines, and the quaking aspen and riverside cottonwood finish their fall.
The conifers now dominate completely: Douglas-fir, the great western redcedar, western hemlock (the state tree) with its drooping leaders, coastal Sitka spruce, and inland ponderosa pine. The temperate rainforests of the Hoh and Quinault grow lush again in the returning rain, every trunk furred with moss and fern, and the broadleaf Pacific madrone keeps its glossy leaves and feeds wintering birds with its orange-red berries on the Puget Sound bluffs.
Go deeper with the Washington guides
The complete Washington birding, native-plant, wildflower, and night-sky guides — or the whole year in one bundle.
Same month elsewhere: November in West Virginia · November in Wisconsin · November in Wyoming