What to look for in nature in Georgia this November

When do sandhill cranes fly over Georgia?

• Cranes over the Piedmont and Metro Atlanta

  Late November through December, on clear days · Statewide; overhead in Atlanta, Athens, Macon and Columbus

  Flocks travel in long, ragged lines and V’s that bend and re-form as the birds catch thermals. Most continue to central Florida. Birds Georgia names the state’s wintering spots: the Okefenokee, Grand Bay Wildlife Management Area near Valdosta and Eufaula National Wildlife Refuge on the Chattahoochee. The same profile notes that thousands now winter at Hiwassee Refuge on the Tennessee River, something they did not do before the 1990s, and that a few occasionally turn up on Atlanta’s Christmas Bird Count. If you see a flock, note the time and direction and enter it in eBird; those reports are how the passage is mapped.

• Cranes settle into the Okefenokee

  Arriving from mid-November; most leave by late February · Chesser and Grand prairies, eastern side of the swamp

  A refuge ranger who spent years listening for them wrote that the migrants usually reach the swamp in the second half of November and stay until the second half of February, an estimated 3,000 to 5,000 birds across the refuge’s 700 square miles. The Okefenokee also keeps a small resident flock that never leaves. The open wet prairies on the east side, seen from the Chesser Island boardwalk near Folkston, are the best bet. The ranger described the call as a shrill, rolling “garooo-a-a-a,” and in the evening it mixes with frogs, herons and the odd alligator grunt.

Which winter birds arrive in Georgia in November?

• Bald eagles repair their nests

  Nest work now; eggs November to February · Coast and barrier islands, Middle Georgia reservoirs, the Savannah River lakes, the lower Flint and Chattahoochee

  Georgia DNR’s eagle page gives the calendar: eggs are laid from November through February, and coastal pairs can begin and finish as much as two months before pairs in north Georgia. About 95 percent of nests are in big living pines, built just under the top of the canopy. The DNR’s 2026 survey, reported in June, found 113 occupied territories in the areas flown, 101 of them successful, with 170 young fledged; the DNR thinks the statewide total has stayed above 200 nests a year since 2015, up from none known to succeed through most of the 1970s. About a third of the nests are in the six coastal counties. Watch from a distance, since disturbance can make a pair abandon the nest; an eagle carrying a branch in November is building.

• Ducks and sea ducks come in

  Building through the month · West Point Lake and the big reservoirs; Savannah NWR; Altamaha WMA; the sounds and beaches

  Many waterfowl arrive in growing numbers now, Bird Watcher’s Digest says, and by late November even the hardy northern ones are here: common goldeneyes on big inland lakes, West Point above all, black scoters along the coast, and red-breasted mergansers. The Laurel Hill Wildlife Drive on Savannah National Wildlife Refuge, on the South Carolina side of the river, is open from sunrise to sunset all year and is an easy place to watch the refuge’s impoundments fill with ducks.

• Sparrows and pipits in the fields

  All month · Short-grass and harvested fields; the Coastal Plain for vesper sparrows

  The winter sparrows are all present by November. Walk the edges of a cut hayfield or a harvested cotton or peanut field and look for Savannah sparrows, vesper sparrows (mostly in the south) and American pipits, which walk rather than hop and bob their tails. In the wet woods of north Georgia, rusty blackbirds turn over leaves in shallow water.

• Winter finches: a quiet year forecast

  If they come, late fall into winter · Feeders and pine woods statewide

  Issued on September 25, this winter’s outlook from the Finch Research Network does not expect “any big irruptions” of finches in the Southeast this winter. It allows that pine siskins could make a small to moderate flight this far south, doubts a large red-breasted nuthatch movement after last winter’s, and expects any purple finch flight to be small and late. A siskin at a thistle feeder would be a good find, not a sure one.

• Winter hummingbirds

  Any time from fall through winter · Feeders statewide, more often in the south and on the coast

  A hummingbird at a feeder in late November is almost never a ruby-throat. The DNR lists nine species seen in Georgia, and the rufous is by far the most frequent in winter: more than 100 were documented in one winter. Others, such as the calliope and black-chinned, appear a few times a year. Keep a clean feeder going, photograph the bird and phone the DNR’s Wildlife Conservation Section in Forsyth (478-994-1438) so it can be recorded.

• Project FeederWatch starts

  November 1 to April 30 · Any yard, balcony or schoolyard

  The winter-long count run by the Cornell Lab and Birds Canada opens November 1. Count on any two consecutive days you like, no more than weekly; for each species, write down only the biggest number on view at a single moment, then submit. The organizers suggest five or more days off between count periods. A Georgia list in November should run to cardinals, chickadees, titmice, Carolina wrens, the first juncos in the north and yellow-rumped warblers almost everywhere.

When does the rut peak in metro Atlanta and the mountains?

When do right whales come to the Georgia coast?

• What last winter brought

  Season runs mid-November to mid-April · Nearshore waters from the Savannah River to Cape Canaveral

  NOAA Fisheries counted 23 calves in the 2026 season, the highest number since 2009, and about 500 sightings of 129 different right whales in the Southeast, more than a quarter of the population. Thirteen of the mothers had calved in 2021 or 2022, a gap close to the healthy three to four years and far shorter than the recent average. The first whales usually appear off Georgia in late November or early December.

• How to recognize one

  Calm mornings, December into March · From beaches, piers and boats

  Right whales reach 50 feet but show little above the surface: a broad black back with no fin, big splashes, white water that keeps reappearing in the same place, and a V-shaped blow when they exhale. The DNR asks anyone who sees one to call 877-WHALE-HELP (877-942-5343) or radio the Coast Guard on VHF channel 16. By law, boats must keep at least 500 yards away.

Why look for salamanders in a dry pond in November?

• Marbled salamander

  Breeding around Halloween; eggs wait into November and December · Upland hardwood forests with seasonal ponds, statewide

  A stout black salamander with silver-white crossbands. The Amphibian Foundation in Atlanta says marbled salamanders breed “around Halloween” and lay their eggs on land along the upper edges of dry seasonal wetlands. Animal Diversity Web adds that the female stays with the clutch to keep it moist until water floods the nest, and the eggs hatch as soon as the rains do. In a dry year they can wait through the winter. In Atlanta they have become scarce: the foundation surveyed 110 sites inside I-285 and found them at only two, and it has since helped return them to restored pools at Clyde Shepherd Nature Preserve and the Atlanta History Center, which released 58 larvae into its Swan Woods pool in 2022.

• Frosted flatwoods salamander

  Rainy cold fronts, October to December · Longleaf pine flatwoods; one known Georgia site

  Its fall movement is set off by rain-laden cold fronts, when adults walk at night to small, isolated wetlands in pine flatwoods, the Georgia Biodiversity Portal says. It was once known from 51 places in Georgia; in the past decade only one pond, on Fort Stewart, has produced larvae. It has been federally threatened since 1999, and the Amphibian Foundation runs the only captive breeding program in the hope of releasing young back into the wild. You will not see one, but the next rainy night in November is its night.

Where are the leaves still turning in November?

• Witch hazel in flower

  September to December; most noticeable after the leaves drop · Moist woods, streamsides and bottomland edges, north and central Georgia

  Late in the year, an understory shrub with thin, crinkled yellow petals like strips of ribbon is witch hazel, a native the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center lists as flowering from September into December. Last year’s seed capsules are on the same twigs; as they dry they split and can shoot their seeds about 30 feet.

• Georgia aster, last flowers

  Into November · Open oak-pine woods, roadsides where fire or mowing keeps the canopy open

  The state’s own rare aster, violet with a yellow center, blooms through October and November, so the first half of the month still has flowers. Take pictures, log them on iNaturalist and leave the plants.

Has Georgia had its first freeze yet?

How early does it get dark in Georgia in November?

Is November wet or dry in Georgia, and what will El Niño bring this winter?

What is in Georgia’s night sky this November?

• The Leonids

  Best before dawn on Wednesday, November 18 · Anywhere dark; face east to south after midnight

  Expect an ordinary showing: the International Meteor Organization predicts no outburst and a rate near 15 an hour in a truly dark sky. The predicted peak, 6:45 p.m. EST on the 17th, comes before Leo has risen, so Georgia’s best chance is the following morning. In Atlanta the moon sets at 12:47 a.m. on the 18th and civil twilight starts at 6:46, which leaves a dark window of about five hours, best toward dawn when the radiant is highest. Tuesday and Thursday mornings bracket the best one and are worth an alarm too.

• The Beaver Moon, a supermoon

  Full at 9:53 a.m. EST, Tuesday, November 24 · A low eastern horizon at sunset

  Since exact full falls on Tuesday morning, both Monday’s and Tuesday’s moonrises look round. On Tuesday it rises at 5:23 p.m. in Atlanta, seven minutes before sunset, and at 5:14 p.m. in Savannah, also seven minutes before the sun goes down. It is close to perigee, about 360,800 kilometers away, which makes it a modest supermoon, and the Cold Moon in December comes nearer still. Overnight from Monday into Tuesday the moon also passes over or very near the Pleiades, though its glare hides the cluster.

• Taurid fireballs and a dark new moon

  Southern Taurids peak November 5; Northern Taurids November 12; new moon November 9 · Anywhere dark, most of the night

  Both Taurid streams are slow and sparse, 5 to 10 an hour at most, but they are known for bright fireballs. They are debris of Comet Encke, and the new moon on the 9th leaves the nights around it dark. Watch from late evening on, once Taurus is well up in the east.

• A crowded morning sky

  Before dawn all month · East and south before sunrise

  Venus is the brilliant morning star, climbing higher each week and at its brightest around November 24 to 27; Spica sits about a degree from it on the 9th. In Leo, Mars closes on Jupiter until only 1.2 degrees separate them before dawn on the 15th and 16th. Low in the east-southeast, Mercury makes its best showing from about November 18 to 25. Around the middle of the month all four planets are up together before sunrise. After dusk the lone bright planet is Saturn, high in the south.

• Dark-sky nights at Okefenokee State Park

  Friday, November 6, 8:30 to 9:30 p.m. · Okefenokee State Park, Fargo

  The park, formerly Stephen C. Foster and certified as an International Dark Sky Park, holds Dark Skies Stargazing on the evening of the 6th, with a waning crescent that will not rise until after 2 a.m. It costs only the parking fee and is canceled for storms or heavy cloud; call 912-637-5274. Bring a red flashlight and a chair or blanket.

What can Georgia families do outside in November?

Safety notes for November in Georgia